Matt Dunn’s ankle injury was just the latest chapter in a tale of woe for Surrey this summer.

The 27-year-old speedster burst back onto the scene at the Guildford Festival, claiming 13 wickets in two matches against Somerset and Yorkshire, including a career-best 5-43 in the first match.

But Surrey’s fitness saga, which started when a virus swept through the squad on their pre-season trip to Dubai and has seen all but a handful crocked at some stage, had another painful chapter to come when Dunn rolled an ankle in training while preparing for this week’s Specsavers County Championship encounter with Warwickshire at the Kia Oval.

Skipper Rory Burns had already reflected: "It's just as well we've got a decent-sized squad because otherwise we might have struggled to get 11 players on the park.”

At least he was fit to return, a back problem blamed for his absence against Yorkshire, but a week off which might have eased their selection worries saw Dunn join Conor McKerr and Stuart Meaker among the crocked fast bowlers while Jade Dernbach is still on the way back from a calf strain which sidelined him for the first six weeks of the season.

Wandsworth Times:

Surrey were able to gain permission from the ECB to play Sam Curran – who is centrally-contracted to the board and thus in their control – after he had played club and second team games on the way back from a hamstring pull suffered a month ago but a limitation was place on the number of overs he could bowl in the match.

Having made Yorkshire follow on in their previous Championship outing, a drawn match severely disrupted by rain, the county champions were hoping to build on that against a side who beat them by 130 runs at Edgbaston in late May, one of two defeats in their opening six matches which left them one place off the bottom of the table.

Yet they were bowled out for 194 on Sunday’s opening day at the Kia Oval – the highest score extras with 40 – and saw Warwickshire reach 89-1 by the close, described by head coach Michael di Venuto as “one of the worst days in my time here”.

Restricting the visitors to a lead of 36 on the second was a fine effort as Morne Morkel, Curran and Jordan Clark all finished with three wickets. Mark Stoneman top-scored with 71 and Curran added a half-century in Surrey’s second innings of 325, Warwickshire needing 290 for victory in more than a day and leaving Burns’s men with much work to record their first four-day victory of the season and only the second in all cricket.

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