LANCASHIRE rang the changes as they set their sights on Lord's in the Cheltenham and Gloucester Trophy at Old Trafford today.

Peter Martin and Glen Chapple passed fitness tests to return to the team against Sussex, with Mike Atherton and Graham Lloyd also back to boost the batting.

Lloyd, who was dropped from last week's Championship defeat at Kent after the briefest of first-team returns with one innings against Surrey, warmed up for the game with a brilliant unbeaten 148 for the seconds in their one-day victory against Notts yesterday.

Mark Chilton weighed in with a half century but was left out today, with Lancashire sticking with Chapple as Atherton's opening partner.

Chapple also played for the seconds yesterday and picked up a couple of wickets to prove his recovery from the side strain which kept him out at Canterbury.

And Martin completed a full-strength Lancashire team, although with heavy overnight rain and a poor weather forecast both for today and tomorrow, he joked: "I'm going to practise bowling at stumps."

The match would be decided by a bowl-out if no result is possible either today or tomorrow.

Sussex were missing their all-rounder Robin Martin-Jenkins but still fielded a lively new ball pairing of Jason Lewry and James Kirtley.

Skipper Chris Adams was the main batting threat although openers Richard Montgomerie and the Zimbabwean Murray Goodwin have been in good form.

And in the middle order, Holland's Bas Zuiderent played an impressive innings when Sussex beat Lancashire under the Hove floodlights in the National League last season.