County are battered by Lancashire (From Worcester News)

County are battered by Lancashire

7:46pm Sunday 12th July 2009 in

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BASEMENT boys Worcestershire are still searching for their first LVCC County Championship Division One win of the season.

They crashed to a seven-wicket defeat at title hopefuls Lancashire inside three days.

Paul Horton (77) recorded his highest championship score for more than 13 months to help the Red Rose county chase down 264 at Old Trafford.

Horton was helped along by Mark Chilton’s 45 as the pair shared 109 for the second wicket.

VVS Laxman later hit an unbeaten 64 off 93 balls and Steven Croft 40 not out off 81 in an unbroken stand of 91 to guide the hosts home.

Mal Loye was trapped lbw by Matt Mason in the fourth over of the day for 17 to leave the score at 42-1.

But Horton and Chilton negated the threat posed by Mason and picked off Ashley Noffke in particular.

The pitch seemed to have slowed up during the day and the swing present during the first two days died down.

Worcestershire were given a ray of light by off-spinner Gareth Batty when he removed Horton caught by Daryl Mitchell at first slip.

Five overs later, Chilton lunged forward and looped a catch off Batty to Ben Smith at short-leg.

Rain forced the umpires to call an early tea with Lancashire on 184-3 but they easily knocked off 80 more runs, leaving the visitors with just three points.

On Saturday, Stephen Moore recorded his first championship century of the summer with 107, including 18 fours, as Worcestershire posted 236 in their second innings. Spinner Gary Keedy took 4-60 from 17.1 overs.

Worcestershire pace bowler Mason earlier took a superb 7-39 to bowl the hosts out for 145 in their first innings.