Morecambe CC captain seeking favours in promotion battle

Morecambe sit third in the table with two games remaining in the Moore and Smalley Palace Shield Premier Division.

With Fleetwood already up as champions, Briggs’ players are eight points behind second-placed Eccleston with 24 up for grabs in the final fortnight.

The first of Morecambe’s final two matches comes at Woodhill Lane on Saturday when they host Euxton.

Saturday’s visitors will have a pivotal role in who wins promotion given they host Eccleston on the final day.

“We need a favour now from someone else,” Briggs said of their promotion chase.

“Having said that, there’s still a chance we can do it but Euxton’s run-in is a good thing and a bad thing.

“They are a team that’s good enough to beat Eccleston in the last game but, if we win on Saturday, that gives them nothing to play for on the last day.

“Ultimately, we can only concentrate on ourselves and, if we win both of our last two games, that puts the pressure on Eccleston.”

Morecambe go into Saturday’s game on the back of a two-wicket win against Croston last weekend.

They had allowed the bottom club to recover from 100-6 to post a score of 163-7 before edging to 164-8 in reply.

“We were terrible for the first 15 overs of the game,” Briggs acknowledged.

“We clawed it back for the next 15 but then let it slide and, when we batted, it got more nervy than it needed to but we had a lot of batting down the order.”