Lancaster CC lose to Northern Premier Cricket League high flyers

They went down by eight wickets at Longridge on Saturday in a match pitting second top against second bottom.

Lancaster, last season’s runners-up to Blackpool, had chosen to bat first but were made to rue that decision as they were all out for 138 midway through the 48th over.

They were up against it from the off as Matt Greenall dismissed Irfan Khan (1) and Jon Millward got the better of Jack Lord (0).

That made the score 2-2 before Lancaster skipper Jamie Heywood and Eddie Steinson attempted to rebuild.

Their stand had reached 33 when Heywood (18) was out to Caleb Bradford and Steinson (18) was Millward’s second victim without further addition to the score.

It got worse for the strugglers when Luke Platt ran out Steven Fisher (0), meaning they had lost three wickets for no runs in collapsing to 35-5.

Greenall saw off Kieran Moffat (10) and Bradford dismissed Lee Marshall (1) to leave the score 62-7.

However, the Lancaster lower order began to frustrate the Longridge attack in more than doubling their total for the final three wickets.

Ben Simm was joined by Liam Moffat, adding 37 for the eighth wicket before the latter fell to Millward for 16.

Simm and Lee Sparks put on a further 33 before Greenall saw off the latter for 23 to leave the score 132-9.

The end came six runs later as Simm was last man out for 44, out to Tom Howarth.

That gave him figures of 1-19 as Greenall claimed 3-27, Millward 3-44 and Bradford 2-42.

In reply, Longridge saw Rhys Morgan (7) out to Kieran Moffat but Josh Mullin and Howarth led the run chase.

They put on 103 for the second wicket before Simm dismissed Howarth for 52.

That was as good as it got for Lancaster as Mullin’s patient 59 not out and a brisker 14 not out from Tom Turner took Longridge to 141-2.

Kieran Moffat finished with 1-31 and Simm 1-36 for a Lancaster team now sitting eight points from safety.

Next up for them is a home match against Leyland on Saturday (12.30pm).