Alviro Petersen (105*) hit the 41st century of his first-class career to give Lancashire a strong platform on the first day of their Specsavers County Championship match against Middlesex at Lord's.
The South-African hit his second Championship century of the season to guide the visitors to 298/3 at close, sharing an unbroken partnership worth exactly 100 runs for the fourth wicket with captain Steven Croft (34*).
Teenage prodigy Haseeb Hameed had earlier threatened to record back-to-back hundreds for Lancashire, but he fell for 89 in the afternoon session after sharing 97 runs with Petersen for the third wicket, although he did manage to pass fifty for the fifth time this season.
Hameed set a platform for the rest of the Red Rose batsmen with another mature innings, sharing 65 runs with Luke Procter (45) either side of lunch, after Lancashire won the toss and decided to bat first following their 11-point draw against Warwickshire earlier this week.
Tom Smith attempted to see the shine off the new ball alongside his 19-year-old batting partner, but the Middlesex skipper James Franklin (1-32) enjoyed immediate success with the ball to find the first breakthrough for his side. The New Zealand all-rounder struck with the final ball of his first over, trapping Smith lbw for 17 at 36/1, but Hameed and Procter were able to see the visitors to lunch without any further setbacks.
Procter made an eye-catching start, hitting four boundaries in his first 12 balls at the crease, injecting a degree of impetus to Lancashire's morning session progress. The duo achieved a fifty-partnership before the lunch break, as the visitors reached 87/1. Having made excellent progress before lunch, Procter found his hopes of securing a second fifty of the season cut short when he edged Tim Murtagh (1-56) to Ollie Rayner at second slip.
An uncharacteristic rush of blood saw Hameed dispatch Toby Roland-Jones for six with a pull shot, as the Bolton batsman went on to reach fifty for the fifth time this season in 137 balls. Hameed found excellent support in Petersen and the pair went on to add a watchful fifty-partnership in 122 balls, with Petersen playing a restrained and mature innings.
When tea arrived, Lancashire had two strong sessions under their belt, reaching 176/2 and both Hameed and Petersen were approaching their respective milestones. Following his maiden first-class century against Warwickshire on Wednesday, Hameed was well on his way to repeating the feat after the interval, but Roland-Jones (1-74) denied the promising youngster successive hundreds.
Sam Robson took a juggling catch at first slip to send Hameed on his way for 89 after he and Petersen added 97 runs for third wicket, but this was to be the final glimpse of success for the home side. Petersen's patient half-century arrived in 97 deliveries with only one boundary to his name, with the Lancashire captain surviving two dropped catches in quick succession.
The first of these opportunities came with Croft on 17, as he skied Rayner to Paul Striling for a simple catch, but the Irishman - who received his county cap earlier in the day - put down a routine chance, with Croft showing noticeable gratitude for this let-off. These two dropped catches were sandwiched by the third fifty-partnership of the innings, one that came up in just 58 balls, as Petersen hit Rayner for four and then a big six over mid-wicket in successive deliveries.
Croft was then gifted a second life on 19 when Robson got a hand on a sharp chance in the slips, although in truth the ball came at such speed that he did well to stop it from going to the boundary. When the new ball arrived, Middlesex were able to wear the opposition down in the fading light at Lord's, but Petersen stood firm to reach his second century of the season in 159 balls, with only 14 deliveries left in the day.
The milestones continued to be ticked off into the latter stages of the opening day, as Petersen and Croft achieved the first hundred-partnership of the match in 154 balls, three balls before the close. This partnership, worth precisely 100 runs at stumps, had taken Lancashire to a strong total of 298/3, with Petersen's combination of patience against the newer ball and aggression to the spinners reaping rewards for the Port-Elizabeth maestro.
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