SIMON Harmer tormented Hampshire with bat and ball as Essex racked up a huge advantage in their LV= Insurance County Championship fixture.

South African Harmer claimed eight for 46 – his first of the season and the best figures by anyone so far in the 2022 Championship – to condemn Hampshire to a 75-run first-innings deficit.

He then totted up 61 to go alongside Adam Rossington’s 60 to ease Essex away from 51 for five and to set Hampshire a target of 299, taken down to 264 by the close, writes Alex Smith.

Across the three innings, all 14 wickets in the day fell to spin bowling – with Liam Dawson picking up his best Hampshire figures of seven for 68 and Felix Organ three for seven on a pitch full of turn.

Harmer, who began the day with four for 23, unsurprisingly began from the River End and bowled 15 balls before he added his 25th five-wicket haul for Essex – bowling a reverse sweeping Keith Barker around his legs.

Hampshire’s mantra for the morning was clearly to ‘score their way out of trouble’. Barker had struck two fours and a six off Harmer alone and Kyle Abbott would thrash three sixes in a 23-run over off Dan Lawrence. 95 runs were scored in 55 minutes, but Harmer was constantly taking wickets.

James Fuller screwed to cover, Ben Brown – following a punchy 38 – was caught behind and Abbott was caught at deep midwicket as Hampshire were bowled out for 163, with Harmer mimicking his figures from the previous evening. He now has over 200 first-class wickets at the Cloud County Ground, Chelmsford since joining in 2017.

Spin continued to be the way forward as Hampshire turned to Organ and Dawson in the fifth and sixth overs. Organ initially did the damage as he had a driving Alastair Cook caught at first slip and Tom Westley brilliantly caught at short leg with his fifth and sixth deliveries.

Dawson had Dan Lawrence lbw to a full ball on the stroke of lunch before Paul Walter and Michael Pepper came and went after the interval – the former leg before to Organ and the latter reversing Dawson to point.

Hampshire looked on a roll and Essex in trouble, but Browne and Rossington’s contrasting styles navigated the hosts back to a strong position. Browne was resolute, while Rossington’s assertiveness was best typified by dispatching his second delivery for six.

Both helped to soften the ball and make batting easier, as the bounce and turn started to be nullified, in a 54-run partnership – with Rossington contributing 42 of them.

Browne fell for a 98-ball 33 when he turned Dawson to leg slip, the lead on 180 before Harmer entered to show off his batting prowess. He and Rossington added 47 more runs.

Rossington stamped his authority and batted Hampshire out of the game will have gone some way to do that, his 50 coming in 52 balls, although he fell for 60 when he chipped to mid-off.

Harmer added a further 34 with Shane Snater before the Dutch international splintered to midwicket to give Dawson his fifth wicket – only the fifth five-for of his first-class career.

Harmer moved to his 82-ball half-century with a six into the Hayes Close gardens before he and Sam Cook fell to successive balls to give Dawson the second seven-wicket return of his career – in doing so he became the first spin bowler not called Harmer to take a five-wicket haul at Chelmsford since Gareth Batty in 2014.

In 13, overs Organ lifted Harmer out of the ground thrice as Hampshire reached 35 without loss by stumps.

Essex 238 & 223 lead Hampshire 163 & 35/0 by 263 runs