When the sinking sun stopped play on the penultimate day of Lancashireâ..s home campaign, it also set on any realistic hopes of a first outright Championship since 1934. How ironic that sunshine spoiled things. In five home games Lancashire had already lost the equivalent of 10 daysâ.. play to rain. Away from home they won four from eight. Would they have collected enough extra points from those rainy home matches to overhaul Sussex? The chance would have been a fine thing. So, like many of their predecessors, they were Championship nearly men. In the C&G Trophy they were also runners-up to Sussex. There were redeeming features: Mr Consistency Mal Loye; a bornagain Dominic Cork; the runs of Brad Hodge before his departure (his replacement Nathan Astle never quite got going); and the emerging youngsters. Despite few starts Kyle Hogg and Oliver Newby improved while Tom Smith started the season as an unknown and ended it making plans for a winter with the ECB Academy in Perth. With luck it will not be raining there.

Andrew Collomosse The Wisden Cricketer