Jordan Thompson has reflected on a job well done for Yorkshire on day one of their LV= Insurance County Championship clash with Warwickshire at Headingley.
Thompson and captain Steve Patterson claimed three wickets apiece, added to two each for Matthew Revis and Tom Loten.
Warwickshire won the toss, elected to bat and could only post 244, including 96 from Michael Burgess, who batted expertly with the tail to add respectability to a day which could have been much worse for the Bears without his intervention.
Yorkshire then closed on 28-0 in reply to heighten their chances of a second victory in six Division One games.
“We’ve bowled well today, got our rewards and bowled them out for a respectable total,” said Thompson. “244 is good in our eyes. We’d have liked to have bowled them out for early 200s, but Burgess batted well.
“We got the openers early doors and then dropped numbers three and four again. It looked like being deja vu from previous weeks, but we got them to make it 40-4 and it didn’t cost us much.
“There was always going to be a partnership on that pitch. The sun was out after lunch and the pitch baked a bit.”
Much has been spoken about the condition of the Dukes balls in the early stages of the season, which has been dominated by runs for all teams up and down the country.
However, balls from a new batch were in use today.
“The old balls were going out of shape and soft, but you don’t know what the reason for that was. The ball today seemed to keep its shape a bit more and stay harder. It definitely swung for a longer period of time,” continued Thompson.
“Whether it’s the pitches being a bit flatter or the balls being bad, we’ll never know. Teams have scored a lot of runs.
“Hopefully we can go out there and score a lot of runs tomorrow.”
Thompson was hugely impressive for figures of 3-74 from 20 overs.
“I feel like I’ve bowled well with the new ball in the last few weeks. At the start of the season, I didn’t get it quite right,” he added.
“Moving forwards into this fourth, fifth and sixth games, I feel like I’ve hit my straps without much luck. It’s been frustrating at times.
“Subconsciously, I’ve been putting a bit of extra pressure on myself with wicket-takers like Coady and Fish missing. Maybe that’s not so helpful for the team because I’ve been going at a few more runs than I’d like.”
