A stunning over from Matthew Hoggard, in which he grabbed three wickets in the space of five balls, sent Yorkshire charging towards a three-day victory by nine wickets in the LV Championship match against Durham at Headingley Carnegie yesterday.

The emphatic win increased Yorkshire's lead at the top of the Division One table and it gave them three straight victories in two competitions from the start of the season.

Hoggard, in his best England form, ended up with 5-32 as Durham were bowled out for 169 and Yorkshire then lost Craig White before knocking off the 30 runs they required.

Joe Sayers was on the field for the whole of the match, carrying his bat for an epic career-best 149 in the first innings, and finishing unbeaten on ten in the second.

In a day packed with drama, Yorkshire drafted in reserve wicketkeeper, Simon Guy, to take over behind the stumps from Gerard Brophy who was suffering from a badly bruised right hand after being struck by Stephen Harmison while batting on Thursday.

Yorkshire began the day on 368-7 with a handy 94 lead and Sayers resumed his innings on 136 but the majority of runs came from skipper Darren Gough who struck Ottis Gibson for consecutive boundaries to move on to 49.

In the same over he was badly dropped at deep cover by Ben Harmison but the bowler's brother, Stephen, immediately made amends by getting Gough caught behind off a brute of a ball which rose sharply.

Stephen Harmison continued to work his way through the tail with hostile bowling which earned him figures of 6-87, his best for Durham in two years, but he could not break the concentration of Sayers who was at the crease nine hours and 13 minutes during which time he faced 417 balls and hit 17 fours.

Durham's hopes of quickly wiping out the 140 runs deficit quickly evaporated as Michael Di Venuto chopped Gough's first ball into his stumps and Hoggard followed up by having Gordon Muchall brilliantly caught by Guy hurling himself to his right.

But it was Hoggard's three-wicket blast in one dynamic over which sent Durham plunging to a disastrous 17 for five. He started by moving a ball across Dale sBenkenstein to have him caught behind and then spectacularly knocked back the stumps of both Ben Harmison and Will Smith as both batsmen played on while attempting to shoulder arms.

The pitch was offering plenty of assistance for Hoggard who rapped Gareth Breese painfully on the hand but Breese and Phil Mustard survived until lunch and took their stand to 55 before there was another shutter. Ajmal Shahzad dismissed Breese lbw and Tim Bresnan accounted for Gibson and Mustard.

Durham hit out gamely in a successful attempt to avoid the follow-on and after Callum Thorp and Graham Onions had added 60 for the ninth wicket, Steve Harmison smashed 21 in an over from Adil Rashid with two sixes, two fours and a single.

Hoggard was recalled to put a stop to the spree and his first ball had Harmison lbw for 23.

Yorkshire lost White while hurrying to their token target but the match was done and dusted with 21 points in the bag well before the tea interval.