JOHN Crawley offered no excuses after one of the worse one-day performances in Lancashire's history at Headingley last night.

Lightning bumbled and stumbled to a nine-wicket defeat, subsiding for 68 and allowing Yorkshire skipper Darren Lehmann to knock off the runs inside 14 overs.

"It was absolutely terrible," admitted Crawley. "There are no excuses. The pitch was a bit slow but there was nothing else wrong.

"We just batted badly, as badly as I have ever known, and they bowled well."

Crawley won the toss, which has been a rare event this season, allowing Lancashire the advantage of batting first.

But things were soon going wrong as he and Sourav Ganguly, who returned from his groin problem,, were out to an impressive opening burst from Matthew Hoggard.

There was no reason to panic at that stage as Neil Fairbrother joined Andy Flintoff, Lancashire's most effective one-day combination.

And they were playing with typical skill until Fairbrother chanced a second run to Darren Gough and was beaten by the England paceman's throw.

There has been a suspicion that Lancashire have been over-reliant on Fairbrother all season and what followed proved it as Craig White ripped out the middle order while Flintoff watched on helpless from the non-striker's end.

Graham Lloyd, Joe Scuderi and Warren Hegg all went cheaply as White earned figures of four for 14 from six overs, and this time the tail could not rescue Lancashire. Flintoff was ninth out for a battling 28 including four boundaries, with Lancashire's total their worse ever in 31 years of the Sunday League -- previously 71 against Essex at Chelmsford in 1987.

And any thoughts that Lancashire could pull off the most unlikely victory after Ian Austin fired out Victor Craven early in Yorkshire's reply were shattered by Lehmann, who slammed an unbeaten 54 from 43 balls.

Austin suffered the worst punishment, conceding 39 runs in 6.5 overs, while Mike Smethurst also suffered on his return to the team.

The defeat leaves Lancashire still eight points adrift in the relegation zone having wasted their games in hand, and Crawley admitted: "We still believe we can stay up but we've got to win every match now, starting with Gloucestershire on Friday."

They will hope to have Mike Atherton back for that after he took a break yesterday -- while his England opening partner Marcus Trescothick was hitting a half century for Somerset against Gloucestershire in another floodlit match in Bristol.

The only piece of good news for Lancashire yesterday came with Peter Martin taking four wickets for the second team in his first appearance since having his thumb shattered by Dominic Cork on June 1.

Martin claimed four for 42 as Glamorgan were all out for 196 on the first day of the championship game at Southport, with Chris Schofield weighing in with three wickets.

But the big test for Martin will come when he bats, as he aims to prove is fitness for Sunday's NatWest Trophy semi final.