County Championship: Sam Hain leads Bears day two fightback against Middlesex

After the loss of 22 wickets on day one at Edgbaston, just two fell on day two as a combination of Warwickshire resistance and the weather held up Middlesex.

Sam Hain led the way with a superb battling 66 not out, aided by 58 from Dan Mousley in a stand of 110.

The Bears had effectively removed any prospect of the game being over in two days well before rain intervened just before tea.

But Warwickshire will now head into day three on 189-4 with a 50-run lead and in the mood to build on a second morning's cricket that proved a lot more successful than the first.

Having been bowled out for 60, their lowest Championship score in 41 years, Hain and Rob Yates resumed on 53-2 in their second innings, still 86 runs adrift.

When Yates was out early on, caught behind off first-day hero Ethan Bamber to give the Middlesex paceman his seventh scalp of the match, there was a genuine feeling that they could be bowled out cheaply again.

But, after initially getting their heads down to ensure survival at the crease, Hain and Mousley then started to pick up runs more freely.

Both reached their half-centuries in quick succession. And, by the time Mousley fell for an Ashes-style leg trap off Tom Helm and holed out to Ryan Higgins on the mid-wicket boundary, their 110-run stand had not only wiped out the 139-run first-innings deficit but put the hosts in credit.

It was a disappointment for Mousley, who has made five of his six career first-class fifties this season, but is yet to convert one into a century.

England Lions man Hain has reached fifty five times this season and converted three into hundreds.

He had reached 66 by the close, to move past 600 runs for the season, with the prospect of more to come on day three, in company with Jacob Bethell, who is on nine.