Surrey pacemen topple Lancs to move closer to title

Aussie paceman Dan Worrall's three-wicket haul included Rocky Flintoff for his first golden duck

Vitality County Championship, Division One, Kia Oval (day four)

Lancashire 204: Hurst 46; Clark 4-57 & 177: Hurst 64; McKerr 4-27, Worrall 3-34, Clark 3-43

Surrey 444-9 dec: Burns 227, Foakes 82; Balderson 3-105

Surrey (23 pts) beat Lancashire (2 pts) by an innings and 63 runs

Match scorecard

County Champions Surrey took less than two sessions on day four to bowl out Lancashire for 177 and complete an impressive innings-and-63-run win.

Conor McKerr polished off Lancashire's tail to finish with 4-27, while Dan Worrall and Jordan Clark each took three wickets as the Division One leaders made it seven wins from 10 to maintain their march towards an expected third successive title.

Matthew Hurst, Lancashire's highly rated 20-year-old, tried hard to hold up Surrey, adding a fine 64 to a first-innings 46, but on a day when teenager Rocky Flintoff suffered a second-innings golden duck on his first-class debut, there was never much doubt about the outcome.

While Surrey now have an even more healthy lead at the top, they only have home advantage for one of their last four matches - and two of those away games are against fellow title challengers Somerset and Essex.

They now face relegation-threatened Notts at Trent Bridge on Thursday, followed by the trip to Taunton, then a home game with mid-table Durham before closing against Essex at Chelmsford in the last week of September.

Lancashire host Hampshire in Manchester on Thursday, then go to Durham, before finishing with Somerset at Old Trafford - and a final-week trip to Worcestershire.

Lancashire resumed still 214 runs adrift on 26-1 after a rain-hit third day had seemingly given them a chance of escaping with a draw. But Worrall, the Championship's leading wicket-taker, made a double breakthrough by dismissing Lancashire captain Keaton Jennings for 13 and 16-year-old Flintoff in successive balls.

Jennings offered no shot as the ball swung back to hit the top of his off stump before former England captain Andrew Flntoff's son edged behind.

Josh Bohannon then chopped Clark into his stumps for 29 and George Balderson edged a returning Worrall to second slip to leave Lancashire 82-5.

After a sixth-wicket stand of 36 with Hurst, Venkatesh Iyer then went to the secoind ball after lunch and, although Tom Hartley offered some resistance, hitting Will Jacks for six, Hurst clipped the first ball of McKerr's second spell straight to mid-wicket. And the end was nigh when McKerr took two more wickets in his eighth over.

Tom Aspinwall lofteda full toss to mid off and Josh Boyden lost his off stump before Hartley was last man out, fending McKerr to short leg for 22.

Report supplied by ECB Reporters' Network.