LANCASHIRE were knocked off top spot in the LV= County Championship after losing by an innings and 125 runs to new league leaders Durham at Chester-le-Street.

After also beating Worcestershire and Warwickshire by an innings, it was 2008 and 2009 champions Durham’s third successive haul of the maximum of 24 points.

They are now 17 points clear of Lancashire, who must now recover from their first defeat of the campaign ahead of their Friends Life t20 campaign, which starts with tonight’s day-night opener against Derbyshire at Old Trafford (7pm). “We’ve played a very good team playing good cricket, and I think our standards probably dropped a bit as well. The result is a setback,” said Lancashire captain Glen Chapple.

“We need to brush up on some of the things we did in this game and get back to how we were playing previously. We’ve got to take it on the chin because we were out-played.”

Lancashire resumed on the final morning on 69-3, needing 204 more to make Durham bat again.

But they were never in the hunt as left-arm spinner Ian Blackwell took 4-34 to help dismiss the Red Rose county for 148 just after lunch.

Lancashire survived for almost an hour without losing a wicket. But once Mark Chilton had gone for 25 there was little resistance and several batsmen surrendered tamely to Blackwell.