MATCH PREVIEW: Lancashire v Durham
Lancashire head to a venue where they have an incredible record.
Lancashire v Durham
Vitality County Championship, Division One
Friday May 17 - Monday May 20, 2024, 11am
Blackpool Cricket Club, Stanley Park
Match Day Guide
The Red Rose are bidding for a first win of the summer at the sixth attempt, one which hopefully lifts them off the bottom of the Division One table following a run of three successive defeats.
The latest of those came against Nottinghamshire at Trent Bridge on Monday when the hosts chased a final day target of 81 to win by nine wickets.
Clearly, the biggest positive was Matty Hurst’s second-innings 104 - a brilliant maiden first-team century.
He will be looking to build on that career milestone at Stanley Park ground, where Lancashire have won 14 of their 18 completed matches across all formats since 2000. That run has included only two defeats. One of those was against Essex in last year’s Championship.
It’s a fabulous record the Red Rose have on the Fylde Coast, where they are likely to come up against England Test captain Ben Stokes, who is ready to begin his home summer.
All the indications are that Stokes will be in Durham’s squad as he gets his preparations underway for July’s Test series against the West Indies.
Durham are unbeaten at the start of the season, sat fifth in Division One with four draws and a win. They drew a high-scoring affair against Hampshire at the Utilita Bowl last weekend.
If Stokes plays, the likelihood is that he will come up against Ashes adversary Nathan Lyon, Lancashire’s overseas off-spinner who should return having been rested at Trent Bridge last week.
Keaton Jennings captains against his former side, while Graham Onions returns as Durham’s bowling coach.
Opposition:
Durham are playing their first season of Division One cricket since 2016, the club fighting back from relegation as part of ECB penalties against them because of financial issues.
Under the captaincy of Scott Borthwick and coaching of Australian Ryan Campbell, the ex-Netherlands head coach, they bounced back impressively last season as Division Two champions.
They sit firmly in mid-table, with their only win against Worcestershire at Kidderminster last month.
Fringe England Test opener Alex Lees was their star of last season. He was the leading run-scorer across both divisions of the County Championship with 1,347 runs.
Seamers Ben Raine and Matthew Potts, the latter also on the fringe of England’s Test team, were the leading wicket-takers in Division Two with 60 wickets and 54 respectively. It is pretty easy to see why they won promotion.
Durham signed former Lancashire junior left-arm spinner Callum Parkinson from Leicestershire over the winter, with Netherlands batter Colin Ackermann making the same journey to the North East.
South African batter David Bedingham is one of two overseas players at the Riverside, joined by ex-Lancashire quick Peter Siddle.
He has signed on for six Championship matches, of which this will be the second. He was a last-minute replacement for fellow Australian Scott Boland, who suffered a foot injury on debut last month and has had to return home.
Siddle took 18 wickets in four Championship matches for Lancashire in 2015.
Opposition player to watch:
All eyes will be on the return of Ben Stokes to county cricket, for the first time since May 2022.
All-rounder Stokes initially pulled out of this year’s IPL, and then the forthcoming T20 World Cup, to put all his focus into England’s progression at Test Match level.
Stokes, 32, has been managing a long-standing knee injury, but he is fit and ready to go ahead of the Test summer, which begins in July.
Dale Benkenstein knows more than most how dangerous Stokes can be with bat and ball. He was in the Durham team when he made his first-team debut for Durham in 2009.
Previous meeting:
It is almost five years since Lancashire and Durham met in a County Championship match - the last of them at Sedbergh in June 2019 - and not far off four since the two last met in a first-class fixture.
That is the one we will be recalling here.
But, of the last Championship match - a Division Two affair, that was drawn at Sedbergh, with Lancashire pushing hard for victory with the ball on the final day but thwarted by an unbeaten 92 from Australian Cameron Bancroft. Thankfully, the Red Rose won promotion at the end of the campaign.
The two counties then met again in the Covid summer of 2020, a Bob Wills Trophy clash at Durham’s Riverside - and Lancashire won it by an innings and 18 runs inside three days.
Richard Gleeson claimed three wickets as Durham were bowled out for 180 in the first innings, Josh Bohannon’s patient 75 underpinning a strong response of 308 all out.
Tom Bailey, with a brilliant 3-11 from nine overs, and fellow seamer Liam Hurt’s 4-27 from 10 then wrecked Durham’s second innings. They were bowled out for 110.
It was one of two wins from five matches in the North Group of that competition. Lancashire went on to reach the BW Trophy final the following summer.
What they said:
Durham will always have a place in the heart of Keaton Jennings.
After all, they were the county who gave Lancashire’s current captain his first shot at English cricket when he first arrived in early 2011 as a South Africa Under 19s international.
It is, therefore, no surprise to hear Jennings say that he is delighted to see his former county back in Division One for the first time since 2016 when they were relegated as part of ECB penalties against the club for financial issues.
Jennings was part of that team which was relegated and again at the start of the 2017 season when they started on -48 points in Division Two.
The left-handed opener left for Emirates Old Trafford ahead of 2018, with things working out well for both parties since. Jennings is delighted with how his move to Lancashire has worked out, while Durham have since fought their way back and won promotion as Division Two champions in 2023.
Asked for his thoughts on Durham’s return to county cricket’s top table, the 31-year-old with a father from South Africa and a mother from Sunderland, said: “It’s huge.
“Durham, at that time (2016) were the longest-serving county in Division One.
“With Paul Collingwood as captain, we were really proud of that.
“What happened was incredibly harsh on the players. We had a 48-point deduction, and you’re trying to play your cricket from miles behind all year. It was tough.
“But what that Durham dressing room had was a group of lads who really stuck together. A lot of them are still there, and a lot of them are still my best mates. A couple were best men at my wedding.
“They’re a fantastic group of lads, and I’m really happy that the club has got back into Division One.
“I’m excited to face Brydon Carse, who was a young pup when I was there. Matthew Potts, as well, Ben Raine - they’re all really good mates of mine.
“I’m looking forward to playing against them.”
Jennings will likely come up against another of his mates in Ben Stokes.
Durham coach Ryan Campbell said of the England captain’s impending return: “If he is available, it will be exciting. I’m sure the crowds in Blackpool will swell.
“England cricket needs a fit Ben Stokes, and what we see next week or after should be pretty impressive.”
How’s Stat!
So let’s break down Lancashire’s excellent recent record at Blackpool, which we mentioned at the top of this preview - 14 wins and two defeats in 18 completed matches since the turn of the century.
In Vitality County Championship cricket since 2000, Lancashire have won four of seven matches, lost one and drawn two.
In List A cricket, Lancashire have won eight of nine completed matches, losing only a friendly to India A. In T20 cricket, they have won both completed T20 fixtures in that time.
This statistic excludes matches which were washed out.