Middlesex‘s four-man seam attack made the most of favourable conditions to put their side in a good position on the opening day of the Rothesay County Championship match against Lancashire at Emirates Old Trafford.

Having opted to bowl first under cloudy skies, the visitors dismissed James Anderson’s side for 201 in 67.1 overs. In reply, though, Middlesex struggled to 38 for 2 at the close before bad light ended play 17 overs early. Both wickets were taken by Anderson in a five-over spell and the visiting batters will surely not relish facing Lancashire’s attack on the second morning

Ryan Higgins took 3 for 48 in the home side’s innings and Toby Roland-Jones‘s 3 for 45 included the vital wickets of Marcus Harris and Keaton Jennings. But this was very much a team effort by the Middlesex bowlers.

Seb Morgan, who finished with 3 for 41, and Naavya Sharma supported the new-ball attack superbly and Lancashire’s only comfort came from Jennings’s watchful 67 and Australian allrounder, Chris Green, who made 35 in his first game of the season before he was last man out, bowled by Morgan

The morning session was a struggle for Lancashire’s batters and they did well to get to lunch on 78 for 3. Middlesex’s four seamers made the most of Leus du Plooy winning the toss on a cloudy morning and the introduction of Sharma and Morgan to replace Higgins and Roland-Jones brought no great reduction in quality.

But it was the more experienced bowlers who took the wickets. The first of these fell to the 12th ball of the day when Higgins brought one back off the seam to have makeshift opener George Balderson lbw for 8. Josh Bohannon then laboured stoically to score 15 runs in 89 minutes off 48 balls before he was well beaten by the first ball of Higgins second spell and Joe Cracknell pouched the edge. Three overs later, though, and ten balls before lunch, Middlesex dismissed Marcus Harris for 5 when the Australian’s attempted drive off Roland-Jones caught the toe of the bat and Sharma took a fine catch diving to his right at mid-on.

Lancashire’s problems only deepened during a slightly shortened afternoon session in which they scored 96 runs for the loss of four further wickets. The most significant of these was that of Jennings, who was blamelessly caught behind for 67 off a fine delivery from Roland-Jones. But it was significant that the opener had made his runs off 148 balls in 220 tough minutes and by the time he was dismissed, Michael Jones had been bowled by Morgan for 27 and Matty Hurst caught at slip by Higgins off Sharma for 7.

When Tom Hartley was caught behind off the ubiquitous Higgins for 3, Lancashire were 164 for 7 and there was relief in the home dressing room when bad light stopped play 3.5 overs before tea.

The delay lasted no longer than the normal tea interval and batting conditions on the resumption were the best of the day. However, this did not prevent Lancashire losing their last three wickets for 13 runs.

But the last nine overs of play belonged to Anderson, who had Sam Robson caught at slip by Jones for 6 before knocking out Max Holden’s middle stump in his next over when the Middlesex batter had made only 5. And the visiting batsmen will have been grateful to see the clouds darken and the umpires take the players off when over an hour’s cricket remained in the day.