NSW centurion Moises Henriques believes the Blues' rollicking first-day scoring rate has them well placed to push for an outright victory in their Sheffield Shield clash with Tasmania.
Resurgent Henriques' cracking unbeaten 116 from 153 balls - his seventh first-class ton - underpinned NSW's 5-392.
It was also his first hundred in what has been a disappointing season, having previously mustered just 138 Shield runs at 12.54.
He will be chasing more quick runs Sunday ahead of a likely early declaration.
"It would be fair to say I haven't scored as many runs as I would have liked, so I was happy to spend some time out there in the middle," Henriques said.
"We've done ourselves a favour by scoring quite quickly. I don't think we're going bat for too long (on Sunday).
"I don't think it's going to break up as much as a typical SCG wicket, so we're going to have to grind hard for our 20 wickets."
Henriques and Kurtis Patterson (72) combined for a belligerent 156-run fourth-wicket stand before Patterson was castled by a peach of a ball from Tom Rogers (3-78), who was easily the pick of Tasmania's bowlers.
"I was struggling to build pressure so I was trying to hit the top of off stump and build a few dots," Rogers said.
"Fortunately it snuck through.
"The wicket was pretty good to bat on and it was pretty hot out there but that's no excuse.
"We should still be doing our job."
Henriques and Patterson allowed NSW to assume complete control post-tea after the Tigers made some inroads in the middle session, with Nick Larkin (85) and an aggressive Ed Cowan (68) succumbing in quick succession.
Earlier, Daniel Hughes (22) fell to a diving, one-handed Matthew Wade catch behind the stumps - his 300th in the Shield - before Larkin and Cowan combined for 115 for the second wicket, setting up the platform for Henriques.
Share
