Only two teams have garnered more batting bonus points than Sussex this season. But it was hard to see how.

The county side collapsed alarmingly after Murray Goodwin and Tim Ambrose had wrested the initiative from Lancashire on the first day at Hove.

After making painstaking progress before lunch, when they scored just seven runs in eight overs, the fourth-wicket pair produced a thrilling counter-attack in the hour after the interval when another 91 were added in 18 overs to take their side to 190-3.

But Glen Chapple, who had taken two wickets in his first over, returned to the attack to remove first Ambrose (60) and then Goodwin (87) in the space of three overs and Sussex were suddenly on the slide.

Their last six wickets fell for just 50 runs in 21 overs, three of them to leg-spinner Chris Schofield who finished with 3-21 as the county were bowled out for 240.

It was the former England man's first Championship game since Sussex drew at Old Trafford in May when both Chris Adams and Stuart Law made double hundreds.

Jason Lewry made an inauspicious return to the Sussex attack, conceding 20 extras in his first two overs including six wides, one of which went for four, and two no balls as Lancashire's reply got off to a flying start. They had reached 116-1 from 29 overs at the close, only 124 behind.

Stuart Law is the most successful captain in the history of Australian domestic cricket, having led Queensland to five Sheffield Shield titles, so it's fair to assume that Lancashire's stand-in skipper can assess how a pitch might play. It was still a brave decision to field first, though, and Law might have been regretting it when Goodwin and Ambrose were belting the ball to all parts.

Ambrose scored his first seven runs off 29 balls, but the other 53 off 56 including nine fours and a pulled six off James Anderson which disappeared over the hospitality boxes next to the scoreboard.

Striking the ball confidently off both front foot and back, the Australian youngster scored his second half-century in five innings.

Lancashire bowled poorly in that first hour of the afternoon session, but things changed when Chapple was brought back and got his away-swinger going from the Sea End.

Ambrose edged to first slip and then Goodwin fell 13 short of three figures when he nibbled at one and got a thin edge to the wicketkeeper.

Goodwin's 87 came off 176 balls and included 12 fours. Sussex had been grateful for his application after Chapple had pinned Richard Montgomerie and seen Tony Cottey edge to second slip in his first six deliveries.

The Zimbabwean began the rebuilding job with Chris Adams in a third-wicket stand of 84 which ended when Adams fell leg before to Peter Martin.

It had been hard work at first as Chapple and Martin used all their experience to make the most of a still morning which was conducive to swing bowling.

Law used six bowlers in the morning, but none could match the new ball pair for consistency and accuracy. Anderson, the 20-year-old from Burnley who has taken 27 wickets in six Championship games, struggled as so many bowlers not used to the Hove slope tend to do.

Martin made the breakthrough in his second over back, although there was more than a suggestion that Adams might have got a little inside edge onto the ball which did for him.

Goodwin, too, was furious with himself when he departed after three-and-a-half hours, but he could scarcely have imagined how the county's normally reliable lower middle order would squander his hard work in the space of the next hour.

Matt Prior, dropped at square leg in the previous over, never settled and top-edged a pull off Martin who then uprooted Robin Martin-Jenkins' off stump as he played down the wrong line for a patient 22.

Schofield, in his first Championship appearance of the season, surprised Kevin Innes with a quicker ball before mopping up the tail by having James Kirtley caught at slip as he pushed forward and bowling Mark Davis as he heaved across the line.

Lewry's wonky radar helped Mark Chilton and Alec Swann launch Lancashire's reply with a stand of 69 before Swann was lbw to Martin-Jenkins as he played back to a ball which kept a touch low. It was a deserved reward for the persevering all-rounder while Kirtley bowled 11 overs in his opening spell without much luck.

Lewry returned for three more before the close, this time at the Cromwell Road End, but he was scarcely more accurate.

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