County Championship: Kent v Yorkshire - Adam Lyth & Joe Root hit tons to strengthen visitors' advantage

Adam Lyth's 116 came off 169 deliveries and featured 15 fours

Joe Root's first Championship century in two years put Yorkshire on course for victory over Kent as Adam Lyth also hit a ton on day three at Canterbury.

England Test captain Root hit 101 as he shared productive stands of 119 with Lyth and 96 with Harry Brook (66no).

Lyth top-scored with 116 as Yorkshire declared on 330-5 to leave Kent an improbable victory target of 445.

That task became even more daunting as Jordan Cox and Zak Crawley both fell before stumps, Kent closing on 33-2.

• Relive day three of the County Championship as it happened

Trailing by 411 heading into the final day, Kent will need a captain's innings from Daniel Bell-Drummond (24no), as well as looking to Joe Denly next down the order, to stave off what appears a likely defeat.

Denly will be hoping to replicate the effort of England team-mate Root, who compiled a composed 138-ball ton, his first century in the County Championship since April 2019.

After reaching the milestone, however, Root was bowled next ball when attempting to lift the leg-spin of Denly back over his head.

It was a timely innings from the England captain, who shook off his struggles since his Championship return having been dismissed for 16, 13 and 11 in his prior three innings.

But it did not overshadow the effort of Lyth, who followed up his 97 on the first day by passing the century mark this time and has now recorded at least a half-century in all four of his innings so far this season.

Lyth continued his fine day with a catch at second slip to remove Crawley, shortly after Cox was bowled by David Willey, as Yorkshire took two wickets before the close to shift the advantage even further in their favour.

Kent captain Daniel Bell-Drummond:

"Obviously we need to start well and try to get through that first hour unscathed or with as little damage as possible.

"I feel definitely if we get past the new ball that it's a wicket we can get stuck in on and get the job done on.

"Lyth played very well and deserved his luck. That first hour was a very good period for us, it started to swing, probably for the first time in the game and Grant Stewart and Matt Milnes bowled really well."

England captain Joe Root:

"Adam Lyth's in cracking form. He's played lovely. Let's be honest, he pretty much saved us single-handedly last week. In the first innings it looked like he was batting on a completely different wicket to the other guys. He was hitting it so fluently.

"You need your senior players to step up and lead the way for what is still a young team. It was brilliant to get a couple of wickets before the close of play.

"I know I'm a good player. It's just more of a frustration that coming back you want to be leading by example. I've changed a few things technically, I haven't had the opportunity to face a lot of seam (over the winter), I've faced a lot of spin, so for me to spend some time in the middle was really important."