Yorkshire's march towards the Championship title was checked by Leicestershire who bowled them out for a disappointing 230 at Grace Road yesterday.

Their total produced only one point towards the 37 they need from the remainder of the season to be guaranteed the crown.

But they quickly added another point as the fiery Steven Kirby snatched two wickets with Paul Hutchison adding one of his own for Leicestershire to close in disarray at 23 for three.

Yorkshire's batting plight would have been far worse if it had not been for a sparkling 82 from Michael Vaughan on his return following an operation to remove a cyst from his knee.

It was a quality innings which proved his fitness and is almost certain to result in his recall by England for the fifth and final Test against Australia which begins at The Oval next week.

A century looked on the cards for Vaughan until he flicked too casually down the legside at Phil DeFreitas and gave wicketkeeper Neil Burns one of five catches in the innings.

"I felt pretty rusty at the start and scratched around for my first 30 runs but I then got into a decent rhythm until I tickled one down the legside," said Vaughan.

"My knee felt okay and I had no problems running but it was a disappointing way to get out and I had hoped for a much bigger score.

"It was not easy for the first hour because the ball swung around and Leicestershire bowled pretty decently although we did not bat as well as we would have liked.

"We would have been happier with a bigger score because the match is being played on the same pitch which was used for the CandG semi-final game earlier in the week and it is bound to wear as the game goes on."

Yorkshire were glad to win the toss and bat first on a day of intense heat but Craig White and Matthew Wood were unable to turn it on like last week when they put on 309 for the first wicket in the Roses match.

White was off the mark first ball by driving James Ormond through extra cover for three but in the bowler's next over he chased one which was moving away and edged to Burns.

His loss was not acutely felt because Wood played solidly while Vaughan gradually found his touch, twice playing Devon Malcolm off his toes to the mid-wicket boundary and driving him regally through extra cover for four.

Malcolm then limped off with a slight groin and was not seen again all day, so limiting Leicestershire's resources.

The second wicket pair had put on 96 in 27 overs when Vince Wells bowled Wood for 33 but the Leicestershire captain gained a much bigger prize later in the over.

Darren Lehmann, having little regard for the approaching lunch interval, went for a big drive outside off-stump but edged to Burns and was out for his first Championship duck in his four seasons with Yorkshire.

Vaughan continued on his elegant way, playing well off his legs and through the covers, but both he and David Byas fell to poor strokes, Byas just making contact when off-driving at Darren Maddy and Vaughan flicking the first ball of a new spell to Burns.

DeFreitas moved one away from Gary Fellows to have him caught behind and neither Richard Blakey nor Gavin Hamilton could get beyond 15 after trying hard to slow down Leicestershire's advance.

When Ormond changed to off-spin and had Hamilton driving a catch straight to Aftab Habib at short extra cover, Yorkshire were 189 for eight but Richard Dawson and Kirby bravely took them to a batting bonus point.

Then Kirby was suddenly producing the sort of hostile bowling that brought him a match haul of 12 wickets when Leicestershire were trounced at Headingley earlier in the season.

He did a wardance down the track as he had Trevor White caught at first slip by Byas and another jig followed when he smashed down Iain Sutcliffe's stumps to end the day. In between Kirby's two blows, Hutchison bowled Ben Smith and the new ball pair in the space of 4.5 overs had put Yorkshire right back in the match.

Updated: 09:36 Thursday, August 16, 2001