LANCASHIRE were scrapping for survival at the Oval today after a late, late show by England opener Mark Butcher.

Six more wickets for Muttiah Muralitharan, and an opening stand of 95 between Mike Atherton and Mark Chilton, had almost undone the damage of Lancashire's first innings batting disaster.

But then Butcher's occasional medium pace fired out Atherton, Chilton and skipper John Crawley in the space of 14 balls to force Lancashire onto the back foot again.

They resumed today on 98-3, still six runs behind. It was time for the middle order trio of Neil Fairbrother, who was an early victim today, Graham Lloyd and Andy Flintoff to stand up and be counted with spin wizard Murali ready to pounce in Surrey's second innings.

The little Sri Lankan continued his love affair with the Oval yesterday by claiming six Surrey wickets for 87.

Amazingly, it was his worst-ever performance at the Oval, after he took 16 wickets on his only previous appearance there for Sri Lanka against England last year. It was also his worst-ever performance for Lancashire following his 14-wicket bowling debut against Warwickshire at Southport last week.

But none of his team-mates were complaining after Murali took his Lancashire record to 20 wickets for 204 runs in 110.4 overs.

Surrey were all out for 298 with Alec Stewart falling five runs short of his first century of the season after an impressive return to form.

Gary Keedy made the most of his rare first team chance by taking 3-87 in support of Murali.

Then Atherton continued his encouraging comeback by making 52 until he was trapped lbw by Butcher immediately after surviving a loud caught behind appeal which prompted an angry exchange with former England team-mate Graham Thorpe.

Butcher then had Chilton caught in the slips for 37 and Crawley caught behind down the leg-side for a duck.

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