RICKY Ponting and Surrey marched on towards a position where they could put Derbyshire under pressure on the final afternoon of their LV County Championship match at the County Ground.
By lunch on day four, the away side had overtaken Derbyshire's first innings score and were 65 ahead at 517-6, with former Australia captain run out shortly before the interval for a glorious 192.
The expected plan from Surrey was that they would push on a little further after lunch and then see if they could bowl Derbyshire out cheaply in the second innings. Otherwise, the match is almost certainly condemned to end as a draw.
Surrey were still 90 behind overnight but Ponting and Steve Davies scored briskly from the start.
Davies survived what appeared to be an exceptionally close run-out decision in the third over of the day and went on to score 59 before he was well caught at deep midwicket by Billy Godleman to give David Wainwright a third wicket at 457-5.
Ponting's stay was over when he attempted a quick single and was run out at the non-striker's end by a direct hit from wicketkeeper Richard Johnson. His 192 came off 271 balls with 20 fours and, with it, he moved level with Sachin Tendulkar and Sunil Gavaskar on 81 career first-class centuries.
Gary Wilson (28 not out) and Gareth Batty (0 not out) were together for Surrey at the interval.
