Derby ding-dong

Sensing change after a decade as the second-best team in town, Middlesex seem to have enjoyed winding up Surrey in what one participating master of understatement called a "fairly niggly game". First there were those ball-tampering allegations during Surrey's visit to HQ. Relying on video evidence, as much of the fielders as the bowlers, John Emburey refused to take no for an answer after showing various interested parties, insisting that the ECB hear him out.

After examining the offending article and the footage, officials found nothing untoward, but the bad taste bled into the return match at The Oval, where David Nash and the habitually mild-mannered Jon Batty exchanged unpleasantries in a squalid mid-pitch tête-à-tête. Nash was formally reprimanded by the ECB for language unbecoming and unconfined. "I don't really want to talk about it," sidestepped Batty. "Jeff Evans, the umpire, dealt with it very well," says Middlesex secretary Vinny Codrington, delicacy likewise uppermost.

Codrington reports that interest in the Twenty20 derby at Lord's seems poised to exceed the wildest/most fearful expectations. By the end of May 5,500 tickets had been sold and all 80 hospitality boxes booked.

Moment of the month Lance Klusener's triumphant pulled four off Stuart MacGill in a totesport thriller against Notts, capping a 22-run final over.