The mid-week Yanco Sportsground green top whitened off to produce a deck that yielded 280 runs in 74 overs for only six wickets on Saturday.

The toss was won by L&D and Adrian Axtill (29) and Reece Maguire (43) got their team to 79 before the fall of the first wicket.

Mitchell Hutchinson (2-29) made the breakthrough by having Maguire caught by Matthew Aliendi before Kieran Moon (1-32) chimed in to have Axtill caught at mid-wicket.

Hutchinson looked to spark something for Yanco Hotel by removing Matt Robertson for 0, but this was where the joy ended for the Stags.

Ben Elwin held his position at the other end as Peter Lashbrook produced a resilient 17 to arrest the tide for his team.

He fell to Luke Pygram with score on 138 before Antony Tocin (5) became Pygram's second victim. Pygram's toil from the one end was further rewarded when he dismissed Elwin for 48 on his way to figures of 3-50 off 14 straight overs.

With wickets seemingly falling in bunches, Yanco Hotel would have their last success for the day as Justin Kelly demonstrated his value to his new team.

Having been cleared on appeal during the week to play, Kelly produced a first-up half century for his teammates, his 52no coming at a run a ball, including three sixes.

He was ably supported by Jason Bowe (20no) in getting L&D into a position to declare at 6/228 with 50 minutes left in the day.

In a position of dominance, L&D had nothing to lose and all to gain from their time in the field.

Hotel was given hope by the quality of the surface and the openers prepared to face some of the competition's leading wicket-takers.

Mark Doyle started the New Year from where he left 2014 with a strong 40 not out and David Tiffin (7no) remained defiant down the other end as they saw it out until the end of play.

Axtill (0-7) and Maguire (0-10) tied down the scoring and will be looking to make the breakthrough early next week with Yanco Hotel to resume at 0-52 and a further 177 runs required to secure a first-innings win.