Middlesex chief Angus Fraser has branded Somerset a “disgrace”, accusing them of preparing a “doctored pitch” that he believes accounted for his side’s relegation yesterday.

ECB officials will carry out another investigation on the pitch at Taunton on Friday following Middlesex’s 231-run defeat to Somerset, which led to the defending champions dropping down to Division Two.

The amount of turn on the wicket caused controversy and has been looked at by ECB cricket liaison officer (CLO) Wayne Noon, who deemed it “below average”. A further check will be carried out by another CLO, Phil Whitticase, to see if there is a case for any sanction against Somerset, such as a points deduction.

Fraser, Middlesex’s managing director of cricket, told Standard Sport: “It’s disgraceful what they [Somerset] did. I’ve never seen such a doctored pitch. The intent was there, so the combination of a below average pitch and intent, that changes things. There are guidelines for counties to produce the best possible pitch for matches.”

Middlesex finished just one point behind Somerset, with Fraser feeling further aggrieved over the two-point deduction for a slow over rate during their match at The Oval against Surrey in which a crossbow bolt was fired on to the pitch from outside the ground.

The county are still in talks with the ECB over that penalty and Fraser said that, legally, Middlesex “had to decide what to do”. “We feel aggrieved for a couple of things,” he said. “The pitch and the points deduction. I know they look like excuses but these are reasons for our relegation, even though we haven’t played well enough. The police abandoned that match and we were told, ‘Don’t worry, you won’t lose your points’, but then we found out we had. We’ve since made representations against that.”