Hamish Marshall rediscovered his touch when it mattered most to breathe new life into Gloucestershire's fading County Championship Division Two promotion hopes.

Without a decent score to his name in three months, the former New Zealand Test star had endured a miserable sequence of failures, contributing a meagre 251 runs at an average of 19 in eight matches since registering a big hundred against Derbyshire at Chesterfield in the first week of June.

Under pressure to perform on the second day of the Championship match against Surrey at Bristol, the diminutive batsman demonstrated character aplenty to post an unbeaten half-century which could yet prove decisive.

Marshall found a willing ally in his captain, Alex Gidman, and the two staged a restorative unbroken stand of 136 to put their side 41 runs ahead and firmly in the driving seat.

Having bowled Surrey out for 183 in 58 overs, Gloucestershire CCC reached the close on 224-3 to raise the prospect of a fifth Championship success of the season, one which should keep them on the fringe of the race for promotion.

Gloucestershire's fragile batting during the second half of the season has been well documented, and Marshall and Gidman could easily have folded when they came together shortly after tea with the scoreboard on 88-3.

Neither appeared especially secure while former England paceman Alex Tudor was bending his back from the Pavilion End, but the advent of slow left-armer Rangana Herath and Stuart Meaker brought overdue relief and Gloucestershire's fourth-wicket pair began to flourish amid a flurry of boundaries.

Marshall was first to reach his fifty, from 71 balls, with six fours and two sixes. Gidman required one ball more to achieve the same landmark, in the process smiting seven fours and a huge straight six off Herath.

Gloucestershire needed these two to go on and they obliged, surviving everything the visitors could throw at them in the early-evening sunshine as the home side assumed a position of strength.

Failure to make best use of the new ball on a rain-affected first day served to galvanise Gloucestershire CCC's seam attack when Surrey resumed their first innings handily placed on 96-1. Their reward for bowling a fuller length was immediate and tangible, nine Surrey wickets falling for the addition of just 87 runs as the visitors slipped to 183 all out.

As on so many occasions this season, Steve Kirby and James Franklin led from the front, demonstrating nagging line and length to claim three wickets apiece and fatally undermine the opposition.

From the moment Kirby had Arun Harinath brilliantly caught by the diving Marshall at second slip in the fourth over of the day, Surrey were in freefall, eight wickets tumbling during the morning session alone.

Having seen Franklin and Kirby initiate the slide, change bowlers Anthony Ireland and Ian Saxelby did the rest, despite being asked to bowl into an unrelenting headwind.