DERBYSHIRE'S batsmen were fighting a rearguard action against Worcestershire today as they were reduced to 10 men after Chris Bassano was forced to pull out of the game because of a family illness.

Bassano, who last month became the first player to score a century in each innings on his CricInfo County Championship debut, flew back to Tasmania to be with his father Brian who has suffered a stroke.

His absence left Derbyshire to score 347 to avoid the follow on.

But the fierce heat helped the Worcestershire pace bowlers to swing the ball and they battled to 134 for one from 38 overs by the close of a day twice interrupted by rain.

Worcestershire were already in a commanding position at the start of the second day on 390 for five and although they lost Nick Boulton in the second over of the morning, the lower order lifted the total.

Steve Rhodes, dropped at second slip by Dominic Cork before he had scored, made an unbeaten 37 and there were also useful contributions from Andrew Bichel, Kabir Ali and Alamgir Sheriyar.

The Derbyshire bowlers, with Cork the main culprit, did not help their cause by bowling too short and Worcestershire reached 496 before Sheriyar drove Paul Aldred to cover.

Bichel and Sheriyar then subjected the Derbyshire openers to a testing 13 overs before rain drove the players from the field for an early tea.

Both Luke Sutton and Steve Stubbings were troubled by lavish swing and there were numerous edges which flew just out of reach of the close fielders.

Worcestershire finally broke through when Kabir replaced Sheriyar and in his first over, he got one to bounce and move away from Sutton who edged to Rhodes with the total on 44.

When play resumed at 5.20pm, the sun had finally broken through the haze but Worcestershire struggled to make further inroads on the docile pitch.

Stubbings and Stephen Titchard played with determination but Stubbings was given a life on 38 when he edged Kabir to first slip where Vikram Solanki spilled the catch.

The left-hander put that escape behind him and reached his 50, which came off 85 balls, with his eighth four.

He was unbeaten on 63 at the close and Titchard, who had shown admirable application on his recall to the team, was not out 37 as Derbyshire ended the day 362 runs behind, but with a chance of making Worcestershire work hard over the remaining two days.