JOHN Crawley backed up new Lancashire coach Bob Simpson's prediction that he is heading for an England recall, on the first day of the new cricket season.

The Red Rose skippper, who struggled for most of last summer after his golden 1998, stroked a typically classy 126 as Lancashire piled up 364-3 declared on the first day of their game against Cambridge University.

He had already hit a century in the first game of Lancashire's pre-season tour of South Africa, quite a contrast to last year when he only managed two all season.

Surprisingly, it was Crawley's first ever century at Fenners, even though he spent three years studying in Cambridge himself. And he beat by one day the record set by Mark Chilton last year for the earliest century in an English season -- although Crawley's name will not go into the record books as he was pipped to the post by Somerset's Michael Burns, who also passed three figures against Oxford at Taunton.

It was typical men against boys stuff, with Joe Scuderi making the most of the chance he was given at number three by making 51 in a second wicket stand of 111 with Crawley.

Mike Atherton was the only man to miss out on his return to Cambridge. But Crawley's dismissal, after facing 219 balls and hitting 17 fours in an otherwise chanceless knock, was followed by a savage innings from Andy Flintoff, who hammered 80 from 35 balls with 10 fours and four sixes.

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