IT proved to be a frustrating afternoon for Worcestershire as the rain halted them in their chase of Durham's 425/9 on day two of the County Championship match at Chester Le Street.

Ed Pollock scored a quickfire 41 inside just 6 overs as The Pears reached 50 in rapid time after Durham declared in the morning session.

Worcestershire were 96/1 before Azhar Ali was trapped LBW by Matthew Potts and that proved to be the final ball of the day as the umpires took the players off for bad light.

The rain then came down and eventually the rest of the day was chalked off just before 5PM.

Durham started the day on 364/7 with Ben Raine and Paul Coughlin at the crease for the hosts.

And they picked up from where they left off in the closing stages of the first day, with the pair taking their partnership to three figures before Coughlin was trapped LBW by Adam Finch for 42.

And then when Ben Gibbon caught Raine (71) off the bowling of Dillon Pennington, the hosts declared on 425/9.

The Worcestershire response was emphatic and rapid as opener Pollock raced to 32 not-out after just 20 balls and together with Jake Libby, the pair brought up the 50-run partnership inside six overs.

Pollock struck nine 4s before being bowled by Matthew Potts for a quickfire 41 and then Ali and Libby began building another decent partnership. 

The pair stayed firm to reach 67/1 at lunch but the skies above darkened and suggested some rain was on its way.

With the light fading, Ali was trapped LBW by Potts and with that, the teams were taken off by the umpires due to bad light. 

Then the rain started to fall and an early tea was taken ahead of a further pitch inspection at 5PM but the rain had not stopped and the umpires called a day on proceedings.