Bat dominates ball in Championship draw
A match where willow totally usurped leather petered out into an inevitable draw at The Spitfire Ground, St. Lawrence where Division One rivals Kent and Warwickshire shared the Specsavers County Championship spoils.
Kent banked 10 points, while Warwickshire will be equally pleased with nine points toward their survival tally.
However, it was a placid Canterbury pitch that had the major say in proceedings, enabling Dominic Sibley to hit a career-best 244 as well as his fourth successive Championship hundred against Kent in as many matches.
Sibley’s opening partner Will Rhodes also chipped in with his first Championship hundred of the summer allowing the visitors to reach 574 for seven before a declaration allowed the teams to shake hands on the draw at 4.50pm with Warwickshire still 11 runs behind on first innings.
Kent’s top order filled their boots too. Sean Dickson and Daniel Bell-Drummond both reached the 160s in their season’s best total of 585 for seven declared, while youngsters Zak Crawley and Ollie Robinson both eased to half-centuries.
It was the bowlers, therefore, who toiled without reward as only 14 wickets fell over the four days.
Sibley took all that Kent’s attack could send down in his stride. He moved past 242 – his previous career-best for Surrey posted at The Kia Oval against Yorkshire in 2013 – with a single to deep point, after Warwickshire had posted their 450 from the 1,000th delivery of the innings.
The 23-year-old from Epsom finally came unstuck when, in attempting a lap-pull against medium pacer Bell-Drummond, he skied one off the top edge to be caught at short fine leg by Heino Kuhn running back from first slip.
Kent’s players were quick to shake hands with Sibley as he departed from his mammoth innings.
Earlier in the final day, Kent snared Adam Hose and Matt Lamb LBW to Ollie Rayner and Stewart respectively, then, in the mid-session, Tim Ambrose was run out chancing a single to extra cover.
Kent’s head coach Matt Walker defended the pitch and applauded his own side’s batting prowess.
He said: “It’s been a tough four days for the bowlers for sure, but I’ve got nothing but praise for our groundsman, Adrian Llong, who has been brilliant since taking over in the close season.
“We’ve asked him to take more moisture out of the wickets here, which he’s achieved and we’ve asked to play on better wickets.
“The fact is, this is just a bit docile and it’s ended up as a bore draw. Sometimes that happens, there’s no blame attached to it at all.
“The bottom line is we’ll walk away with 10 points and with a number of our top-order batsmen feeling in good touch and move on to The Oval next week with a good draw behind us.”
Walker added: “We said at the start of the season that if we can’t win a game, then we must ensure we don’t lose and come away with batting points in the bank, and that’s what we’ve achieved this week.
“We stuck to our tasks really well, considering it’s such a flat pitch and the sun’s been shining throughout. It would have been easy for us to slip into complacency mode, but none of our lads have done that and we can move on to play Surrey full of confidence.”
Credit: ECB Reporters’ Network
England Lions will face a touring Australian Test warm-up side at The Spitfire Ground, St. Lawrence in July as the visitors gear up for the 2019 Specsavers Ashes Series against England
Purchase tickets in advance to save £5 on gate prices >>>
