LANCASHIRE's players drank champagne with Surrey last night after winning £50,000 for finishing second in the Championship for the third year running.

It is a fine achievement for skipper John Crawley, deputy Warren Hegg and the rest of the Old Trafford team, especially after the holes left in the team by the departure of Muttiah Muralitharan and Peter Martin's injury problems.

Their record before the current game was seven wins, seven draws and a single defeat against Surrey at the Oval -- the most consistent in either division.

But their hopes of ending the season with an eighth win, and revenge against Surrey were frustrated by two extremes in the September weather.

The start of play yesterday was delayed by an hour by rain, with heavy showers today threatening to wash out the third day completely.

But yesterday evening it was the sun that caused the problems -- or more specifically its reflection off the roof of the new media centre at the Stretford End. The players went off at 4-50 for 20 minutes, then 5-40 for five minutes, when the Surrey batsmen Martin Bicknell and Saqlain Mushtaq complained that they were being dazzled by the glare.

Fortunately on each occasion it clouded over, limiting the disruption to 25 minutes.

But the stoppages were still hugely embarrassing for Lancashire, who promised to sort out the problem when it first occurred in the game against Kent almost exactly a year ago.

It is astonishing that a Test Match ground has not managed to cover the aluminium roof of the media centre, and the members' slow handclapping was understandable.

It is a good job the title, and Lancashire's second place, has already been decided.

The frustration continued for Lancashire even when play resumed as Bicknell and Saqlain put on an unbroken 54 for the last wicket.

Surrey had slumped into follow-on danger at 111-5 at lunch, and with Chris Schofield picking up four consecutive wickets, Lancashire remained well on top even though they recovered to 193-8.

But then Bicknell joined Gary Butcher to add 50 for the ninth wicket, and even after Butcher had become Glen Chapple's third victim of the innings, hooking to Mike Smethurst at long leg, Saqlain joined the veteran seamer to nudge Surrey towards 300.