HALF-centuries from Alexei Kervezee, Ben Smith and Ben Scott helped Worcestershire trim Surrey’s first innings lead to 28 on day three of their LV= County Championship Division Two clash at Whitgift School in South Croydon.

The visitors had looked set to pass their hosts’ total of 493 when they reached 450 for the loss of only five wickets, but a burst of three wickets in seven balls by Jade Dernbach just before tea put paid to those hopes.

Surrey had reached 57-2 by the close in their second in-nings to establish an overall advantage of 85.

Worcestershire were still 231 runs behind with seven wickets in hand at the start of the day but any hopes Surrey had of enforcing the follow-on in pursuit of their first Championship win of the season were dashed in the first over when Kervezee edged Chris Schofield to slip and Andre Nel put down the catch.

Nel made some amends by having Moeen Ali, who had added only four to his overnight 122, caught at first slip in his second over with the new ball but the follow-on had been averted by a fifth-wicket stand of 77 between Kervezee and Smith by the time Surrey took another wicket.

Kervezee, the Namibia-born batsman who has played for Holland since he was 15, had made 68 off 133 balls with 12 fours when he was trapped lbw to a ball from Schofield that skidded on to him.

Smith and Scott put on another 115 for the sixth wicket before Dernbach made his breakthrough.

First he had Smith caught behind for 80, scored off 163 balls with nine fours. Three balls later he snared Scott, who made his first Championship fifty for two years.

Schofield and Gareth Batty,did manage to clean up the tail as Worcestershire lost their last five wickets for six runs in seven overs.

Surrey needed quick runs after that if they were going to conjure a victory but they made another poor start when Arun Harinath and Stewart Walters fell cheaply.