AS sporting drama goes, this may not thrill those who like their action fast and furious - but the fascinating endgame to this season's cricket County Championship has for me been a highlight of the year.

Deadlines dictate that as I write this, the outcome is yet to be determined, a situation that in itself gives a sense of how close the battle has been, how down-to-the-wire the denouement.

There have been very few sporting team competitions in recent times that can boast, going into the final round of matches, three potential champions. That two of them were playing each other simply gave an extra edge to a tantalising situation.

Somerset were done and dusted in three days against Nottinghamshire, and sitting pretty at the top, leaving Middlesex and Yorkshire to battle it out against each other on the final day yesterday. With a draw no good to either side, it was basically winner takes all.

There were heroics aplenty at Lord's on Thursday, where England bowler Tim Bresnan turned hero with the bat to keep Yorkshire in the hunt against Middlesex, ably assisted by two others - Azeem Rafiq and Ryan Sidebottom - also not usually noted for their prowess at the crease.

Meanwhile at Taunton, the epitome of a county cricket ground, Somerset left arm spinners Jack Leach and Roelof van der Merwe, followed off spinner Dom Bess' first innings example by leading the bowlers in skittling their opponents a second time for a 325-run win.

Whatever has been the outcome, county cricket's administrators must be happy with how the season ended.

I have to admit to five-minute catch-ups on the relevant website on Thursday and yesterday, to keep abreast of several hours of cricket during which fortunes ebbed and flowed for all three teams.

In these days of 20-20 Big Bash-style cricket, with fours, sixes and wickets all over the place, it is refreshing and something of a relief to be able to report that the four-day game continues to produce such enthralling fare.

It must be acknowledged that, with the exception of occasions such as have been served up this week, the long form game of the County Championship plays out to small and medium-sized crowds. The money and the profile - Test cricket excepted - is with the shorter forms of the game.

There is talk of reducing Test matches from five to four days and incredibly - as world cricket's powerbrokers do not usually attract plaudits - that is an idea verging on the sensible.

But there is also a move to revamp the 20-20 game on these shores along city franchise lines, seen in some quarters, perhaps not unreasonably, as the first nail in the coffin of the County Championship as we know it.

Of course, the competition will not always produce edge-of-seat finales like this week's, though it has enjoyed more than its fair share of last gasp drama in recent times.

I have to confess that I have not attended a County Championship match since 1990, when Glamorgan hosted Worcestershire at Abergavenny. Details are hazy at this distance, and I was only there for one day.

But if memory serves, Graeme Hick ran amok with the bat for the visitors, Alan Butcher and Hugh Morris did likewise for Glamorgan, and there were just one or two runs between the teams out of more than 1,600 scored over the four days, Glamorgan just falling short of a thrilling victory in a run chase.

Further back, I was lucky on occasion to see the great West Indies star Michael Holding winding down his career at Derbyshire, still bowling incredibly quickly at all-comers.

One particularly memorable wicket of his was that of Geoff Boycott, against Yorkshire at Chesterfield.

Exploding out of a languid late summer morning in August 1983, this was a delivery so fierce the former England opener had little option but to fend off the ball with his bat straight into the wicketkeeper's gloves, as it snarled up towards his head.

Boycott, back to his stubborn best, made a huge century in the second innings to save the game for the visitors - a perfect example of many down the decades, of the County Championship at its seesawing best.

It is comforting to know, after this week's twists and turns, that it continues to deliver.