Duckett delights again as Kent crumble at home
Kent 230 & 184 lost to Northamptonshire 384 & 31-0 by 10 wickets
KENT’S ambitions of playing in the County Championship top tier took a severe hit in Beckenham as visitors Northamptonshire, and more precisely Ben Duckett, dominated proceedings.
Needing a maximum points win to maintain pressure on Division Two leaders Essex, Kent paid dearly for poor shot selection in both innings.
Bowling in high humidity and under heavy cloud cover for the entire first day, Northamptonshire’s four-man seam attack extracted tennis ball bounce and some swing movement ensuring Kent had to toil for their runs.
Three of them made it past 50; Sean Dickson,Will Gidman and Matt Coles, but all three abetted in their own demise by playing rash, illjudged shots as Rory Kleinvelt picked up three for 70, while Steven Crook and Mohammad Azharullah bagged two apiece, the latter with excellent consecutive deliveries that proved simply too good for the blameless Sam Northeast and Darren Stevens.
Dickson, Kent’s opening bat and top-scorer with 63, conceded the hosts had underperformed overall, describing their first-day efforts as “lethargic”.
“It was a lively deck to start with and moved around a lot,” said the South Africa-born right-hander, who has just signed a long-term contract extension to remain at Kent.
“I got very lucky at times, but I enjoyed getting my head down. After reaching my 50 I wanted to take on their spinners, but got lured in and didn’t come out on top (against Rob Keogh).
“I enjoyed the challenge and felt I’d put us in a good enough position to get to 250 at least. Although we wanted 350, we’d have taken anything over 250.
“The boys were a bit lethargic coming in to bowl (on the first evening) and I guess we performed a bit that way with the bat too if we’re honest.
“Now, we hope the weather holds as we want to get all four days in.You can’t knock our confidence after three wins in a row, so we’ll look to turn things around if we can.”
On the second morning Kent were further frustrated by in-form Northants batsman Ben Duckett, who batted big and took his side into a first innings lead.
With well over 1,100 Championship runs to his name at an average approaching 60, it is little wonder that the diminutive England Lions’ left-hander is now being mentioned in despatches for full England honours.
With a List A double hundred against Sri Lanka to his credit as well as an unbeaten 282 in the Championship against promotion favourites Essex, Duckett looks set for a tour place at the very least this winter.
On a testing two-paced pitch in Beckenham, the 21-year-old was the first batsman in the match to look truly comfortable as he dealt with all Kent’s experienced, yet frustrated attack could throw at him.
As Duckett made a quite brilliant double century, the irony that he was born in Farnborough – barely six miles from the ground – was not lost on Kent’s exasperated fans either.
And the home faithful wouldn’t have been best pleased with their side’s batting either. Reduced to 154 then 22-5 within minutes of the third day starting, the pressure of being in a title race seemed to tell.