County Cricket: Lancs hit by treble trouble (13 July 1999)

13 July 1999

County Cricket: Lancs hit by treble trouble

The Lancashire Evening Telegraph

Lancashire have run into treble trouble with their seam bowlers for the crucial relegation battle against Glamorgan which starts at Blackpool tomorrow.

Peter Martin is definitely missing because of a family bereavement, and Ian Austin and Glen Chapple are both fitness doubts.

Austin suffered achilles tendon damage after taking six wickets in his best performance of the season against Sri Lanka A last week, and Chapple is still struggling with the wrist injury he picked up in the floodlit National League victory over Essex.

They are both named in a 14-man squad, but if they don't make it Lancashire set set to go into the game with only one specialist seamer in Mike Smethurst, with all-rounders Andy Flintoff and Mark Chilton for support.

That is a sign that the Stanley Park pitch will favour spinners, with Lancashire including four - Muttiah Muralitharan, Gary Keedy, Mike Watkinson and Chris Schofield - in their squad.

They desperately need to build on the Murali-inspired victory over Essex in their last match two weeks ago.

Despite that win, Lancashire have slipped back into the bottom three in the Championship below Durham, who beat Nottinghamshire yesterday. They are now only one point above the bottom two - Northants and Glamorgan - and 22 behind ninth-placed Yorkshire, meaning that the losers of the Blackpool clash can virtually resign themselves to playing Second Division championship cricket next year.

Glamorgan were the champions in 1997, but slipped to 12th last year, and in recent weeks they have suffered three innings defeats in their last four matches - suggesting that the news that their Zimbabwean coach Duncan Fletcher will leave for England at the end of the season has affected them badly.

Jacques Kallis, their South African all-rounder, arrived in Cardiff last weekend, but he is not expected to have recovered from the stomach muscle injury he suffered in the World Cup to play at Blackpool.

Lancashire go into the game without Dav Whatmore, who took charge of the team for the last time against Sri Lanka, so skipper John Crawley takes control along with the other senior players - who will include Mike Atherton, after the former England captain came through the Sri Lanka game with no reaction to his back injury.

Lancashire (from): Atherton, Chilton, Crawley, Fairbrother, Flintoff, Lloyd, Hegg, Austin, Chapple, Smethurst, Muralitharan, Watkinson, Keedy, Schofield.

Glamorgan (from): James, Evans, Dale, Law, Maynard, Powell, Croft, Dawood, Thomas, Cosker, Jones, Watkin, Kallis.

Source :: The Lancashire Evening Telegraph