Sussex's bowlers toiled in the sun as their Championship clash with Warwickshire petered out into an inevitable draw at Edgbaston.

The dead slow pitch was the only winner as the home side, replying to Sussex's 601-6 declared, batted throughout the final day to finish on 612-6.

When these teams met at Hove in May, bowlers made hay on a spiteful surface which yielded 761 runs for 39 wickets.

This time the bowlers did all the suffering as, on a track which offered nothing at all to seamers and spinners alike, 1,213 runs were scored for 12 wickets.

The stalemate certainly did nothing to enhance Warwickshire's title aspirations as they lost further ground on Yorkshire who emphatically beat Durham.

In the absence of any sense of purpose to the match as a whole, it was left to individuals and statisticians to garner what they could from it on the final day.

Laurie Evans (an unbeaten 213 from 396 balls with 24 fours, his maiden double-century) and Tim Ambrose (153 from 256 balls, 18 fours) duly filled their boots with a sixth-wicket stand of 327. It was the highest ever sixth-wicket partnership for the Bears and the fourth-highest by any team in the county championship.

Meanwhile, it is only the second time in a match at Edgbaston that both teams passed 500 in their first innings, the only previous occasion being the famous Brian Lara match against Durham in 1994, and the first time both passed 600.

Having started the final day on 367-5, Warwickshire advanced to 443-5 at lunch and then plodded onward in front of a tiny crowd, an estimated 85% of whom slept soundly throughout the afternoon session as the sun blazed down.

Most spectators no doubt missed the departure of Ambrose who top-edged a sweep to short fine-leg to become Peter Burgoyne's first first-class wicket for Sussex.

Evans's concentration remained total though and he eclipsed his previous career-best, though that innings, an excellent 178 in tricky conditions under pressure against Nottinghamshire at Edgbaston in 2013 was, far superior to this one.

As the match heaved itself soporifically towards the cold slab of history, Sussex spread the bowling workload amongst all 11 players with wicketkeeper Ben Brown taking off the pads to exhibit his nifty slow left-arm either side of tea.