Yorkshire may still be heading towards defeat after two days against Lancashire at Liverpool – but this was a much-improved display with the ball.

Andrew Gale’s men endured a demoralising first day when they were bowled out for a paltry 141 on Wednesday.

But they returned yesterday and battled hard to restrict the Red Rose side’s lead, keeping their scoring rate to 2.89 runs per over.

There is still, however, a major amount of work ahead seeing as Lancashire closed on 327-8 from 113 overs, leading by 186 runs going into today’s third day.

But things could have been a lot worse.

“It was a tough day, but the bowlers had to work hard,” said leg-spinner Adil Rashid, who has figures of 1-94 from 30 overs. “The wicket was quite slow. It was dead and easy to bat on.

“But all the bowlers bowled well and got it in the right areas. We kept the pressure on pretty much all day.

“We’ve come back (from being bowled out for 141) and tried to get it right, and we have done that to a certain degree.”

Paul Horton and Mark Chilton were the hosts’ notable performers, scoring 93 off 199 balls and 77 off 174 balls respectively.

They were happy to slowly build a lead, not prepared to take any risks.

The White Rose only took one wicket in each of the first two sessions, with Steve Patterson (2-51 from 24) trapping Karl Brown lbw during the morning.

Horton and Chilton shared 81 for the third wicket inside 32 overs, with the former dropped by Simon Guy off Rashid before lunch.

However, Rashid and Guy combined in the afternoon to remove Horton seven runs short of a third Roses century, leaving the score at 150-3 in the 57th over.

Chilton and Steven Croft (41) then united to share 90 for the fourth wicket inside 31 overs before the former departed early in the evening session.

And that was the start of Yorkshire’s best spell of the day.

It had looked a strange decision from Gale to delay taking the new ball until the 102nd over, but one that paid off with pace bowler Moin Ashraf and the part-time off-spin of Joe Root accounting for three wickets for four runs.

Ashraf had Chilton caught at first slip by Adam Lyth before Root bowled Croft off the inside edge and got Gareth Cross lbw with consecutive deliveries, Lancashire slipping from 240-3 to 244-6 in the 91st.

Ryan Sidebottom got two further wickets, bowling Farveez Maharoof (34) and trapping Glen Chapple lbw, but Lancashire had already edged their way beyond a lead of 150 by that stage.

Luke Procter and Jimmy Anderson will return to the crease today.