Down to the wire

Since the first official County Championship took place in 1890 there have only been three occasions when the title has been shared. It happened in successive seasons in 1949 (Middlesex/Yorkshire) and 1950 (Lancashire/Surrey) and most recently in 1977 when Middlesex and Kent finished tied on points. But on that occasion the end of the season featured a three-county run-in and was also clouded by controversy.

Kent were one of the leading sides in the 1970s in both limited-overs and first-class forms of the game. Middlesex had started the decade without any silverware since 1949, but under Mike Brearley, who took over the captaincy in 1971, they were fast becoming a powerful side. Two losing one-day finals in 1975 - their first - were followed by a Championship title in 1976. In the close season Middlesex also made one of the best overseas signings of the decade, picking up the 21-year-old West Indian fast bowler Wayne Daniel.

For the first half of the summer - the first where the competition was sponsored, by soft-drink company Schweppes - Middlesex, Kent, and Gloucestershire set the pace. In the era when England players also turned out regularly for their counties, Middlesex suffered a blow when Brearley was picked to lead England following Tony Greig's sacking when his involvement in World Series Cricket was announced.

A key game came in early June, when Kent crushed Middlesex by 238 runs in Dartford to put them in second place behind Yorkshire, who, like Somerset, fell away after a good start.

By the end of July Middlesex had gone top by a narrow margin, but some brilliant Brearley captaincy extended their lead. In early August he engineered a remarkable win over Surrey when, in a match where the first two days had been all but washed out, he declared his first innings at 0 for 0 off one ball (innings could not be forfeited at the time) and bowled his opponents out twice before tea for 49 and 89, going on to win a game everyone had written off as a draw by nine wickets.

In mid August Middlesex and Somerset met at Lord's in the semi-final of the 60-over Gillette Cup. All three days (two reserve days were allocated at that time) were washed out and under the regulations the winners should have been decided by the toss of a coin. But with a place in the final at stake, the Test & County Cricket Board, the forerunner of the ECB, decided the game should be replayed the following week. That unprecedented move was made possible because on the days in question Middlesex were due to be playing Somerset but in the Championship. Somerset requested an extension to the season but that idea was rejected.

The sides duly reported back to Lord's but again the rain poured down for almost three days. Eventually it relented long enough for a 15-over-a-side thrash on the Friday - the sixth scheduled day for the one-day match - which Middlesex won at a stroll. In farcical conditions Somerset were bowled out for 59 - after Viv Richards had smashed a six off the first delivery - the game, in those pre-Duckworth Lewis times, coming down to the toss, which Middlesex's Mike Smith won.

Just as important was what happened away from Lord's. Gloucestershire and Kent, both had their matches abandoned without a ball being bowled. Kent, who still led the table by four points, and third-placed Gloucester had seen their game in hand on Middlesex washed out. To rub salt in their wounds, had Middlesex not swapped their own Championship game they too would have suffered an abandonment.

Not everything went Middlesex's way. The rearranged game against Somerset could not take place at Lord's, which was being prepared for the Gillette Cup final, so they had to borrow Chelmsford from Essex to host it, the first time Middlesex had played a home game away from Lord's since 1959. Wretched weather meant the match was drawn.

With two rounds to go, Kent (205 points ) led Middlesex (204) and Gloucester (196). But a stunning win by Gloucestershire as their two rivals again sat watching the rain fall put them in the driving seat for the last round and in with a chance of their first title since the days of WG Grace. They were the only ones of the three with home advantage and led both Kent and Middlesex by five points. Before that round of games, Middlesex secured their first one-day title with a Gillette Cup final win over Glamorgan.

In that final round of matches, all three contenders batted first and all three were dismissed cheaply, but all fought back to ensure come the final day of the season the title remained undecided. Middlesex were the first to wrap up a victory - over Lancashire at 3.30pm - and Brearley's men left Blackpool without hanging around to hear what was happening elsewhere.

In the days before ESPNcricinfo and saturation coverage of sport on the radio, occasional updates on BBC Radio 2 or telephoning other grounds were the only way to find out what was happening. "We've done what we can and we lift our hats to anyone who has done better," Brearley said as he climbed into his car to head back to London.

At Edgbaston, Warwickshire were reduced to 29 for 5 chasing 253 to beat Kent, but a hundred by Geoff Humpage and a last-wicket stand of 45 meant the game went down to the wire, Kent eventually winning by 27 runs at a little after 4.40pm.

All Gloucester had to do was win at a packed Bristol - "the largest I had seen since Wally Hammond's last game in 1951," wrote Alan Gibson - but by the time their rivals had won they all but knew their own challenge was over. Hampshire made light of a target of 271 in 220 minutes and strolled to a six-wicket win in front of an almost silent crowd. The victory was set up by a run-a-minute 94 from Gordon Greenidge, who had been dropped on 30.

That meant Kent and Middlesex finished tied on 227 points with Gloucestershire on 222. The title was shared but it was hard not to feel for Kent who, in a wet final month, had suffered more than the others with the weather, at one stage taking 12 points from four games. And had Middlesex's Gillette semi-final not been rearrangedthey would have taken nothing from their Championship game against Somerset; as it was they took a vital seven points.

"Had Middlesex, the best of the 17 sides, won the title then it would have been marginally more than they deserved," concluded John Woodcock in the Times. "The rearranged Championship fixture with Somerset rankled Gloucestershire and Kent and must not be allowed to happen again."