LANCASHIRE face an uphill battle if they are to force an LV= County Championship win against lowly Leicestershire at Grace Road after another weather-affected day.

There was only time for 27 overs of play on day three of this Division Two fixture, which started at 12.15pm, was interrupted at 1.50pm and resumed at 5.45pm following rain and hail.

The visitors managed to take four wickets as Leicestershire moved from 195-6 from 43 overs to 249 all out inside 57 in reply to a first-innings score of 368, with Kyle Jarvis claiming 5-69 from 19.1 overs.

Lancashire then closed on 39-2 from 11 overs in their second innings, with Alviro Petersen and Ashwell Prince not out.

There is still an outside chance of a third victory in five matches for the league leaders tomorrow, but everything must go their way, not least the weather.

Lancashire currently lead by 158 runs with 96 overs available to them.

They must add runs quickly in the morning and, most importantly, bowl better second time around on a pitch that has offered significant assistance all the way through the match and should not have allowed either side to score as well as they have.

Former Leicestershire seamer Nathan Buck admitted at the end of Monday’s play that the Red Rose bowling performance was a long way below par as they conceded a massive 47 extras.

That total rose to 53 today.

Buck struck once in the afternoon to take his tally of wickets to three, getting captain Mark Cosgrove lbw with an in-swinger for 79 to leave the hosts at 245-8.

That wicket was sandwiched in between two Kyle Jarvis strikes, his third and fourth of the innings.

He trapped Tom Wells lbw before getting Australian overseas bowler Clint McKay caught behind.

Jarvis then trapped Charlie Shreck lbw with the first ball back after a near four-hour break to wrap up the innings.

Lancashire lost Paul Horton run out and Karl Brown caught behind off Shreck, leaving them at 22-2 inside six overs of their second innings.

Leicester are searching for the first Championship victory since the final match of the 2012 season, a winless run that has spanned 37 matches.

Meanwhile, Lancashire captain Tom Smith bowled in the warm-ups yesterday as he nears a return to action from two bulging discs in his back.