Lancashire look to make up ground with a four-day victory at Blackpool CC

Lancashire’s men return to Blackpool CC today as they face a key fixture in their bid for promotion.

The Rothesay County Championship returns for a fortnight, sandwiched between the first and second half of the Vitality Blast T20 competition.

Steven Croft’s players begin a four-day match against Kent at Stanley Park today (11am), featuring the teams sitting fourth and third respectively in division two.

Australian overseas batter Ben McDermott is available, while captain Sir James Anderson has recovered from the calf injury which ruled him out of much of the recent Blast block.

Liam Livingstone will feature in his first red-ball match since December 2022, when he played his only Test for England against Pakistan in Rawalpindi.

He is looking forward to the next fortnight, with Lancashire also facing Derbyshire in seven days’ time, and is desperate to help out a team struggling with some unavailability issues.

“I don't think I’d be playing if everybody was fit, to be perfectly honest,” said Livingstone.

“Jimmy asked and if I was ever going to play for anyone, Jimmy and Crofty are probably my top two people. So hopefully I can try and help out.

“It’s very different. It’s something I haven’t done for a long while so what have I got to lose?

“The last time I played, I had a really good start to my career.

“I don’t really know how it’s going to go, I haven’t had loads of time to prepare for it.

“I’ll have one training session on Thursday and straight in Friday, but I can’t stand here and say I’m really prepared for it - but it is what it is.

“I didn’t think I’d ever play (a red-ball game for Lancashire) again, no.

“I just play so much cricket these days. Sometimes you’ve just got to get away, got to spend some time at home.

“I haven’t seen my wife as much as I probably should have since we got married in October.

“It’s a challenge I want to try and take on, start with these next two games and see what’s what.

“You never know what happens. I may not get picked up in the IPL next year and I can play the full start of the season, I don’t know.

“I won’t look too far ahead, but I’ll start with these two games.”