THE day belonged to Greg Smith but the contest was still no closer to being won in Derbyshire's LV County Championship match against Middlesex.

With one day to go, the draw is favourite to prevail. That would be an appropriate outcome because this has been, in truth, a match in which neither side has played consistently well enough to deserve to win.

Middlesex closed yesterday on 53-2 in their second innings, ahead by 12, after Derbyshire blew the chance to increase the pressure on the away side by establishing a firmer grip on the first innings.

That was despite innings of 80 from Chris Rogers and 113 from Smith out of a total of 347.

It was Smith's maiden first-class hundred and you could say it has been coming, after knocks of 50, 76 and 88 in the last three Championship matches but the closer a batsman goes without breaking through the three-figure barrier, the more it becomes an issue and so there was relief as well as joy for the 25-year-old.

He needed a small slice of luck to get him there, as the ball clipped his inside edge and flew over the stumps to the fine leg boundary but it had been an otherwise chanceless innings played with great composure which was everything the team required.

Smith is in the form of his life and is beginning to live up to the predictions of a bright future that accompanied his arrival from South Africa in 2004. This is his 26th first-class match for the county and after establishing himself as a useful bits-and-pieces type of player, Smith can now be legitimately considered a valuable top-five batsman.

His hundred came off 163 balls and he faced 19 more before Alan Richardson found a nick that was caught at second slip. Smith struck 13 fours.

Rogers (pictured below) looked set to get his own hundred before Indian left-arm spinner Murali Kartik, who was Middlesex's most capable bowler throughout the day, caught and bowled him off a leading edge.

No other Derbyshire batsman really produced. Tom New managed a very scratchy 31 after being dropped three times before he made double figures and Rikki Clarke found no relief from the burden of captaincy as he mistimed a drive to cover for 21.

After Smith was out, Derbyshire slipped from 300-5 to 321-9, largely because of a good spell of three wickets in successive overs from Richardson.

The first innings lead of 41 was less impressive than Derbyshire would have believed was possible when Smith was in full flow but Middlesex made very heavy weather of overhauling it.

Billy Godleman faced 53 balls for two runs before he was caught at second slip by Clarke off Jon Clare and they had struggled to 45 in the 25th over when Ed Joyce was the second man out, lbw to the eighth ball of Smith's off-spin.

His day had gone so well that it felt almost inevitable Smith would feature again in an important way and, just before Joyce's dismissal, Smith's throw from deep backward point had almost accounted for Eion Morgan.

Morgan, on nine, was half way down the track when he was sent back and would have been out by a street had New gathered the ball cleanly behind the stumps but he fumbled. The poor lad has had a nightmare in a game that has now seen 11 missed chances in total from both teams.

Smith's innings should be duly acknowledged but it is this most damning statistic which sums up more accurately the quality of this match.