BOLTON'S Meg Fairclough led Lancashire Women to a win in their first game of the Royal London Championship on Sunday.
Bringing herself on to bowl when Essex seemed set for a good score at 67-1, the Egerton bowler took two wickets in successive balls and narrowly missed a hat-trick as she pulled her side back into the game.
From there on the Essex innings stalled and with Horwich RMI's Nalisha Patel producing a tight spell to support the other bowlers they fell away to 115 all out.
Any thoughts of a comfortable win when Lancashire were 55-1 quickly disappeared as they, too, lost middle-order wickets quickly on a pitch that proved quite tricky to bat on before reaching their target with seven wickets down.
The next game is against Worcestershire on May 30 at Northern CC.
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