Cricket-Roland-Jones hat-trick leads Middlesex to County title

LONDON, Sept 23 ( Reuters) - Toby Roland-Jones took a hat-trick to lead Middlesex to the English County Championship title with a dramatic 61-run victory over Yorkshire at Lord's on Friday.

Yorkshire, chasing 240 for a win that would have secured the trophy for the third year in a row, collapsed to 178 all out, Roland-Jones claiming the final two wickets in successive deliveries to clinch victory with less than five overs to spare. He also claimed a wicket with the last ball of his previous over.

Somerset, who beat Nottinghamshire on Thursday, would have won the title for the first time if the game at Lord's had ended in a draw.

That looked the likely outcome when Yorkshire laboured to 153 for five but Roland-Jones completed figures of six for 54 as the visitors lost their last five wickets for 18 runs to give Middlesex the trophy for the first time since 1993. (Reporting by Ed Osmond, editing by Pritha Sarkar)