Darren Lehmann today became the greatest run-scorer in Australian domestic first-class cricket but what should have been a memorable day for the South Australian skipper turned out to be a day of disappointment.

Paul Gough15-Dec-2001Darren Lehmann today became the greatest run-scorer in Australian domestic first-class cricket but what should have been a memorable day for the South Australian skipper turned out to be a day of disappointment.While Lehmann was surpassing his former skipper Jamie Siddons’ record of 10,643 Pura Cup/Sheffield Shield runs, his team was crashing to an outright defeatinside three days against a Victorian side which coming into this match had failed to collect a point all season.Despite having use of the best batting conditions of the match, South Australia could only make 303 in its second innings today as every batsman failed to convert their start into a big score, including Lehmann.That left Victoria needing only 128 to claim the six points to lift itself off the bottom of the table which it easily achieved with nine wickets to spare thanks to 70 not out from Jason Arnberger and 45 from Matthew Elliott.Lehmann and Greg Blewett were always going to be the key wickets for the Bushrangers today but like so many of their teammates both got out just as theyappeared set to produce big innings.Blewett was the first victim of the day, brilliantly taken one-handed by Elliott at first slip off the bowling of Ian Harvey for 41 in the first of what would be three catches for the day for the Bushrangers vice-captain.That brought Lehmann to the crease with the left-hander needing just 17 runs to break Siddons’ record.But after reaching the mark effortlessly, which he acknowledged by raising his bat to a small but appreciative MCG crowd, he departed just nine runs later on 26 when he cut Mick Lewis straight to the safe hands of Elliott at gully.And for Lehmann that took some of the gloss of his record-breaking day.”It was nice to get it (the record) out of the way but I was one of the batters that just didn’t score enough runs,” he said.With Lehmann and Blewett gone and the Redbacks still 17 runs short of making Victoria bat again, the Redbacks had little chance of batting their way back into the match even though stubborn resistance was provided by Ben Higgins, Nathan Adcock and bowlers Brad Young and Mike Smith.But crucially all four were dismissed between 40 and 60 when the Redbacks desperately needed at least one batsman to go and make a big hundred and put some pressure back on the Victorians.For Victorian skipper Paul Reiffel the victory was a major relief after a disastrous start to the season.”We have been copping a fair bit of criticism which is never good,” he said.”But I felt that performance has been coming, we’ve been slowly working towards it.”The win lifted Victoria above Tasmania on the points table and into fifth position on six points with South Australia now in fourth place and only two points ahead of the Bushrangers.