After the mid-season break from Rothesay County Championship Division action, Kent visited Middlesex at Merchant Taylors’ School in Hertfordshire with promotion hopes very much still alive.

Bertie Foreham and Grant Stewart were omitted from the Kent thirteen man squad named one day prior and having won the toss, captain Daniel Bell-Drummond elected to bat.

Ben Compton and Zak Crawley faced the new ball and survived for just over half an hour before Compton, having escaped one big appeal, was adjudged LBW to Tom Helm for thirteen and he walked off disconsolately.

That brought in Sam Northeast and he and Crawley fought their way through a difficult spell and started to enjoy themselves. Crawley reached his half century from 81 balls with eight boundaries and they went in to lunch at 117 for 1.

When Crawley took fourteen off an over by Eathan Bosch, he looked good for a century but those hopes were dashed when he flashed at a Ryan Higgins delivery that had been given a bit of width, and edged it to Helm who took a sharp catch at first slip.

Neither Tawanda Muyeye nor Bell-Drummond really looked settled and both departed to the excellent Toby Roland-Jones while Northeast was completing his half century off 117 deliveries. He continued to grind it out and was unbeaten on 87 at tea with Chris Benjamin on 21, despite some ‘interesting’ attempted runs, as Kent went in on 271 for 4.

Heavy rain for twenty minutes caused a delay to the restart but only two overs were lost. When the match resumed, Northeast was adjudged LBW to Roland-Jones despite being well forward without having added to his score. Ekansh Singh joined Benjamin but their partnership was short-lived as Benjamin perished soon after, bowled by Helm. Bad light stopped play at 278 for 6 with Singh and new bat Keith Dudgeon yet to score.

At 18:15, the umpires held a pitch inspection and stated that play would resume at 18:35 and that four overs and three balls would be bowled. In that period, the half century of extras came up and Kent advanced the score to 299 for 6 with Singh on four and Dudgeon thirteen at the close of play.