wayne parnell says worcestershire will be targeting bonus points on the final day of the specsavers county championship match with lancashire at New Road.
the county collected the first of a possible three bowling points after parnell (2) and club captain joe leach (1) had reduced lancashire to 32-3.
an unbroken partnership of 78 between liam livingstone (53) and haseeb hameed (22) steered the visitors to 110-3 from 33.2 overs by a premature close because of bad light at 110-3 – a lead of 12 runs.
only 71.3 overs out of a possible 288 have been possible on the opening three days due to torrential rain leaving a draw as the most likely outcome.
parnell, who made a successful return from a hamstring injury, said: “for us now, going into the last day, it is probably about trying to get some bonus points and then taking the game deep.
“the rain helped us a bit to take time out of the game but we have to come here tomorrow and try and knock them over and get bonus points.
“we’ve bowled really well as a collective. with the middlesex game, we lost it a little bit in the second innings.
“but other than that, we’ve been really consistent and have done what we set out to do.
“tomorrow is about trying to implement and execute those plans and just trying to get some bonus points.”
parnell followed up his 63 and five wickets in the first innings of the meeting with lancashire at emirates old trafford by dismissing alex davies and rob jones with successive balls in his first over after having a catch put down.
he said: “i’ve always liked to test myself against good opposition. that’s something i’ve wanted to do throughout my entire career so hopefully the better the opposition, the better i perform.
“an eventful first over? it was nice to just get that out of the way after my hamstring injury.
“after working hard and trying to get fit again and then coming into this game and having a couple of days rained of, it was just nice to actually have a bowl and it was a decent first over.
“a dropped catch first ball at slip and then on a hat-trick? that’s the sort of thing i’ve been working on over the last couple of weeks with richo (alan richardson), just trying to keep things very simple, i guess.
“thankfully it looked okay and it felt decent as well but obviously there is still a long way to go for me.”
parnell added: “how did the hamstring feel? it has been feeling really good leading up to this game. i’ve been putting in a lot of work with ben (davies) and dewsy (ross dewar) and they’ve really pushed me.
“it’s also been tricky because we’ve had a lot of rain so i haven’t been able to bowl as many overs as i would have liked so i’ve just taken confidence from the sessions we have had.
“it’s just about being smart and not clever and just sticking within what you feel comfortable and not trying to push it too soon.”
