Hampshire frustrated by a third century of the season for Lancashire's Alex Davies

Alex Davies’ third championship century of the season and an unbeaten 76 by Dane Vilas enabled Lancashire to recover from 69-3 on the second day of this Specsavers County Championship match.

Davies was eventually caught at deep square leg by Michael Carberry off James Vince for 115 but by then he had faced 188 balls and hit 18 fours and a six in an eventful innings which also included two dropped catches and a missed run out opportunity.

However, the Lancashire opener had been aided in the task of restoring his side’s fortunes by Shivnarine Chanderpaul, with whom he put on 74 in 16 overs.

That partial recovery ended a few overs before tea when Chanderpaul was neatly stumped by Lewis McManus for 33 after being well beaten by a ball from Brad Taylor which turned beyond the edge of his bat.

What was noticeable and quite unexpected about the Davies-Chanderpaul stand was the freedom with which both batsmen played.

Having garnered only two runs from five overs at the outset of their partnership, the pair added 47 from the next five with both batsmen hitting Taylor for six and Sean Ervine conceding 20 runs in his two overs of anodyne slowish bowling.

Davies then went on to share a stand of 90 for the fifth wicket with Vilas, who batted impressively in the evening session.

Ryan McLaren was unbeaten on 23 at stumps by which time Lancashire were 117 in arrears. All of which represented a considerable improvement for the home side on the position in mid-afternoon when Steven Croft was leg before to Kyle Abbott for one with the home side still 326 runs behind Hampshire’s total.

Lancashire had earlier lost Rob Jones leg before to Gareth Berg for two, and Luke Procter for eight when the left-hander lost his off stump to a Berg inswinger.

In the first session of the day Kyle Abbott was left three runs short of what would have been his maiden first-class hundred although his 134-ball 97 had made a major contribution to Hampshire’s substantial first-innings total.

The visitors were eventually bowled out for 395 – riches, indeed, when one considers that they were 177-6 at one stage - but the session had begun well for the home side when Taylor was caught at slip by McLaren off James Anderson for 18 in the third over of the day.

However, Matt Salisbury and Abbott then added 43 runs in untroubled fashion before Salisbury, having made a composed 14, skied McLaren to Chanderpaul at mid-on.