MOORES: LANCASHIRE LOVE LIVERPOOL

Date: 3rd September 2010

A Paul Edwards copyright exclusive for L&DCC Official Website.

At Aigburth: Fourth Day of Four: Lancashire (22pts) 398 and 171 for 7, defeated Hampshire (2pts) 160 and 405 by three wickets.

This is a Paul Edwards exclusive and the copyright is held by this website

A match which many thought would not last beyond its third afternoon eventually occupied the whole four days set aside for it and finished in a manner surely few had envisaged as Lancashire defeated Hampshire by three wickets with just one ball to spare in a thrilling finish at Aigburth on Friday evening.

Set to score 168 in 33 overs, Glen Chapple's batsmen had struggled to 44 for four in nearly half their allotment before Gareth Cross's 18-ball 24 had supplied some much-needed acceleration. And while Cross was supplying power, Shivnarine Chanderpaul was providing the craft in his innings of 51, the sixth time in 11 visits to the crease that the Guyanan has passed fifty since his arrival in July.

Sajid Mahmood quickly adjusted to the tempo of the run chase with a rapid 24, and by the time Chanderpaul was caught behind, chasing a widish delivery from Chris Wood, the home side needed 28 off 29 deliveries to secure the 16 points for a win. Mark Chilton and Kyle Hogg achieved this goal, but not without alarms as Hampshire skipper Dominic Cork conceded only one run off the first four balls of the final over before Chilton cracked his former team-mate though point for the boundary which sealed the victory.

Lancashire's win was greeted by a huge cheer from the Liverpool crowd, and Red Rose coach Peter Moores confirmed that Merseyside's affection for his team is reciprocated.

"The lads love Liverpool and always have done," said Moores. "That's why we're going to use it as a base next season. It's got history and character and I think people underestimate how much players like to play at grounds like that. It's also got a pitch which produces good cricket and if you speak to people like Glen Chapple or Mike Watkinson, they'll tell you about lots of good games that have taken place here.

"You've always got a chance of being bowled out because it normally swings, but if you get in, you can always score and I think that's what we've seen in this game."

The difficulty of scoring at 5.09 runs per over on a fourth day wicket was emphasised when Lancashire's pursuit got off to a dreadful start. Paul Horton was comprehensively bowled by James Tomlinson when attempting to hit across the line in the fourth over and Karl Brown was lbw when pushing forward to the next delivery.

Tom Smith followed his team mates to the pavilion two overs later, at which time Lancashire were 17 for three, and Steven Croft completed a poor individual match when he nicked Cork to Bates in the 15th over. That brought Cross out to Chanderpaul, at which point, the complexion of the innings changed.

But if it was the strains of Lancashire's victory song which was echoing across Aigburth at the conclusion of this game, there was no doubt whatever that Hampshire's Jimmy Adams was the man of the match. The opener took his overnight 110 not out to 194 on Friday and batted in all for 635 minutes in his side's second innings.

Adams's effort frustrated and fatigued the Lancashire players, even as it was winning their admiration. By the time he nicked Hogg to Cross, he had faced 507 balls, meaning that his innings was the longest in the County Championship this season both in terms of balls faced and time at the crease. If there has been a better knock in the LV= Division One in 2010, no one in the Aigburth press tent could recall witnessing it.

And yet the morning had begun well for Lancashire, who took four wickets for 39 runs inside the opening 80 minutes of the day. Sajid Mahmood took the last of these when he caught and bowled Tomlinson for three to leave Hampshire on 317 for nine and with a lead of just 79.

Adams was on 136 when that wicket fell and he clearly regarded the imminent prospect of a home victory as a stimulus to further herculean effort. He found a steadfast partner in No11 Danny Briggs, who comfortably survived the forty minutes until lunch and then batted on another two hours until 3.40, when Adams finally succumbed to a jubilant Hogg. By then the last wicket partnership had yielded 88 runs and extended Hampshire's lead to 167.

But if this game is destined to remembered as Adams's match, the Hampshire opener at least shared his domination of the morning session with Tom Smith, who took three wickets in five overs to raise Lancashire supporters' hopes that the matters would be satisfactorily concluded by mid-afternoon.

Again operating from the River End, Smith ripped out Michael Bates's middle stump in the fourth over of the morning and then trimmed Dominic Cork's off bail ten minutes later. When the 24-year-old knocked out Chris Wood's off pole via the inside edge, he seemed set for the first ten-wicket haul of his career, but instead had to settle for career-best match figures of nine for 134 from 53 overs. But by the time Smith dragged himself off the Liverpool turf in the afternoon's high heat, the achievement of personal milestones had taken second place to sheer relief.