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Lancashire’s best efforts were unable to prevent them suffering successive relegations from Division One after their match with relegation rivals, Middlesex, petered to a draw.
A valiant Red Rose failed to clinch the victory that they required to avoid relegation after Middlesex fought brilliantly to bat the rest of the final day of the 2014 season as they closed on 341/8 when the players shook hands.
The crucial stand for the visitors came from James Harris (41*) and Tim Murtagh (29*) who added an uneaten partnership worth 64 runs to deny Lancashire the opportunity to chase an ever-increasing target.
Lancashire started the day needing to claim six more wickets as overnight batsman Eoin Morgan continued to be defiant in the morning session. The hosts failed to strike an early breakthrough with the old ball, but Junaid Khan (3-84), struck with the thirteenth delivery of the new ball to remove the England international lbw for 45.
This vital wicket promised further success for Lancashire but their search for wickets was halted by rain, which caused 14 overs to be lost from the day, a stoppage which threatened to remove a natural end to proceedings.
Rain continued to fall, causing an early lunch to be called at midday, but there was still enough time for Lancashire to force a result. As weather continued to improve, the hosts were pleased to be in the field, but the weather became conducive to batting, making their cause for victory that much harder.
When play resumed Lancashire made further progress when Neil Dexter (17) got an inside edge on to his stumps after facing 105 balls to supply Khan with his third wicket of the innings with the score at 222/6.
John Simpson (7) showed similar determination not to lose his wicket, although his dismissal suggested otherwise when he picked Luke Procter out off Simon Kerrigan (3-106).
Harris had been responsible for guiding his side to a vital batting bonus point in Middlesex’s first innings and proved himself to be a more than useful lower-order batsman across the two innings as he led a rearguard action in the Manchester sunshine.
His defensive stance was complimented nicely by Toby Roland-Jones who found the rope four times in his innings of 34, but when he fell lbw to captain Glen Chapple (1-55) it opened the door once more to the possibility of a miracle.
But this breakthrough was to be the final wicket of the day, and Lancashire’s season, as Harris and Murtagh frustrated the hosts to ensure Middlesex would maintain their Division One status.
The pair batted for nearly two hours either side of the tea interval, as the probability of Lancashire claiming any more wickets became more and more unlikely.
At 4.20 Lancashire admitted defeat and were resigned to relegation after Middlesex ended the match in a position where they fully deserved to stay up.
At the end of the match, Chapple said:"We needed to take a lot of points from this game to stand a chance of staying up. I felt every stage seemed to go our way and we were always in it until about 40 minutes ago.
"I thought we had a really good chance if we got a couple out early, then it's anyone's game. It was fairly difficult to bat first thing, then the rains came, and that didn't help. After lunch Middlesex made batting look fairly easy.
"Whatever would have happened in this game then we would have needed to improve. We've got to be honest with ourselves. The lads have tried their best all year and there's areas we need to improve. The lads are honest enough to look back at the end of the season and asses what we can do to get better.
"We've got talent on the staff. Small areas of improvement make big differences. When we get into games we always compete. Division One is very tough but we've competed with every side. If we can improve in certain areas we'll be better for that.
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