MATCH PREVIEW: Lancashire v Glamorgan
Lancashire and Glamorgan are set for a crackerjack promotion battle this week, with the winner taking a significant step towards playing in Division One next season.
Lancashire v Glamorgan
Rothesay County Championship, Division Two
Tuesday July 29 - August 1, 2025, 11am
Emirates Old Trafford
The buoyant Red Rose are fourth in the table on 124 points with four matches remaining, 21 points behind second-placed Glamorgan (145).
The pair are involved in what is realistically a four-way battle for the second promotion place behind runaway leaders Leicestershire. Derbyshire are third on 128 and Middlesex fifth on 123.
Lancashire head into this fixture on the back of successive away wins over Derbyshire at Chesterfield and Gloucestershire at Cheltenham, the latter by nine wickets chasing 110 last Friday.
Glamorgan, meanwhile, beat Kent at home by five wickets chasing 189.
Steven Croft’s Red Rose have now won two of their 10 fixtures this season, drawing six and losing two.
Opposition
Glamorgan are having an impressive summer in the Championship, having won four of their 10 games so far.
They have not played Division One cricket since 2005, but they will be confident of that changing in the near future.
They are being coached by former England off-spinner Richard Dawson for the summer, on an interim basis. He took over from Grant Bradburn, who left the club during the latter stages of the winter on disciplinary grounds.
Glamorgan are captained by top-order batter Sam Northeast in red-ball cricket, but he missed last week’s game with Kent at Sophia Gardens due to paternity leave.
The Welshmen are the reigning champions in the Metro Bank One-Day Cup.
Their two overseas players are South African batter Colin Ingram and Sri Lankan seamer Asitha Fernando.
Experienced left-hander Ingram is their leading run-scorer with 871 from eight appearances, while seamer Timm van der Gugten has taken 28 wickets.
Opposition player to watch
Ambidextrous spin-bowling all-rounder Ben Kellaway is having quite the season.
He has taken 21 wickets and has hit 753 runs from the middle order.
The 21-year-old Welshman has bests of 181 not out and 6-111 this season.
Kellaway is quite the talent. Right-arm off-spin dominant with the red ball in hand, when he gets hold of the white ball he regular bowls a mixture of off-spin and left-arm spin.
He has only been playing first-class cricket since 2023, and this is without doubt his breakthrough season. Never before has he taken this many wickets in a campaign, never before has he scored as many runs.
Earlier this month, the Newport native was selected by Welsh Fire in the Hundred wildcard draft for next month’s competition.
Previous meeting
This is the first of two meetings between Lancashire and Glamorgan in the last four rounds. The pair end the season with a clash at Cardiff, starting on September 24.
The last time these two counties met in the Championship was in early June 2021, the first summer after Covid when the competition was formatted in Conferences.
Glamorgan won that clash by six wickets inside three days.
A low-scoring affair, all four innings were below 200 on a helpful pitch for the bowlers.
In fact, Australian Test star Marnus Labuschagne with 63 not out in the second-innings chase of 188 was the only batter in the entire match to score a half-century.
Lancashire, inserted, were bowled out for 173 first time around, with Tom Bailey’s tail-end 31 leading the way. The wickets were shared around the Glamorgan attack.
In reply, Lancashire bowled their hosts out for 150, with new-ball duo Bailey and Saqib Mahmood claiming three wickets apiece.
Unfortunately, the Red Rose were bowled out for 164 second time around, with opener Alex Davies making 47 before falling as one of four victims for Aussie new-ball seamer Michael Neser.
Glamorgan started their aforementioned pursuit of 188 just before tea on day two and achieved it comfortably thanks to Labuschagne’s exploits from number three.
Lancashire still went on to finish top of their group with four wins from 12 but finished second behind county champions Warwickshire in the subsequent top group. They also went on to lose the Bob Willis Trophy final to the Bears at Lord’s.
What they said
Steven Croft knows all about a special all-round performance or two, so Lancashire’s interim head coach was almost the perfect man to hail the achievement of Tom Hartley against Gloucestershire last week.
In helping the Red Rose win at Cheltenham, spin-bowling all-rounder Hartley hit a first-innings 130 from number 10 and claimed 11 wickets in the match; six in the first innings and five in the second.
Capped five times by England at Test level in India at the start of 2024, Hartley became only the sixth Lancashire player to score 100 runs and take 10 wickets in the same first-class match and the first since Mike Watkinson did it against Hampshire at Emirates Old Trafford in 1994.
RG Barlow was the first in 1883, while Johnny Briggs achieved it three times, Len Hopwood once and Jack Ikin once.
Ikin and Barlow are the only ones on the list who scored 100 runs in the match but not a century.
“Tommy’s not a number nine or 10, but to have him down there is a real luxury. He really stuck his hand up,” said Croft. “It’s a real special game for him.
“He’s been in and out of both formats, so to put in a performance like that was tremendous to see.
“He’s always had a great attitude. When he’s missed out, he’s always come back in and made the most of it.
“Not just myself, but everyone’s really pleased for him.”
How’s Stat!
Sir James Anderson is set to play his 100th first-class game for Lancashire this week.
Including his debut against Surrey at Emirates Old Trafford in late May 2002, Anderson has taken 389 wickets in 99 matches to date for the Red Rose at an average of 21.54.
That includes a career best haul of 7-19 for any side, including England.