County Championship: Colin Ackermann and Lewis Hill see Leicestershire to three-day win over Gloucestershire

Leicestershire duo Lewis Hill (left) and Colin Ackermann both hit half-centuries to help beat Gloucestershire

Leicestershire kept themselves in the hunt for promotion from Division Two as they closed out a three-day win over Gloucestershire by mid-afternoon.

Colin Ackermann (93) and skipper Lewis Hill (62) shared an unbroken stand of 161 to secure an impressive eight-wicket margin - and hand the visitors their fifth defeat in seven games.

Leicestershire have not played Division One cricket since 2003 and realistically the odds are against them returning to the top flight in 2024, after Worcestershire consolidated their grip on second place by completing a win over Glamorgan at New Road.

But the Foxes have a game in hand away to Sussex next week.

If they can secure a fourth win of the season it would set up an intriguing finale in which Leicestershire and Worcestershire both have to face Yorkshire and Durham in their last two fixtures.

Gloucestershire, relegated from Division One last season, are still looking for a first win, having been bowled out here for 159 and 212 in conditions that, for the first two days at least, favoured the bowlers.

It left Leicestershire needing 168 to win, a target they secured inside 42 overs.

At the start of the day, Leicestershire needed 10 overs to prise out the two remaining Gloucestershire wickets.

Spinners Ackermann and Louis Kimber addressed the matter of their side's sedate over-rate, which had stood at -2 overnight.

Once the dial had been sufficiently moved, Wiaan Mulder bowled Dom Goodman, who chopped on, with his sixth ball and had Luke Charlesworth leg before with his 16th, but 41 from Zaman Akhter was his highest score in 12 first-class innings to date.

Gloucestershire then removed both Leicestershire openers in the first five overs, both caught behind off Josh Shaw, who tempted Rishi Patel to nibble at one outside off stump before Sol Budinger slashed at a much wider ball.

But Hill and Ackermann avoided further mishaps in the 15 overs left before lunch.

Ackermann took back-to-back boundaries off Josh Shaw to reach their century partnership, then Hill completed his seventh half-century of the season, quickly followed by Ackermann's.

Ackermann then took on the lead role, with cuts and late cuts providing the biggest proportion of his 14 boundaries and a six over long-on off off-spinner Ollie Price.

Leicestershire skipper Lewis Hill:

"We can't do anything about results elsewhere but as long as we stay focussed on doing what we do I'm happy.

"And this was a good performance. Colin Ackermann looked fantastic and played some wonderful shots but what has really impressed me has been our bowlers. In my time as captain, and possibly before that, it is the best bowling performance I've seen in terms of being so relentless on a good length.

"We've come to expect that from Wiaan Mulder and Chris Wright but they were so well backed up by Tom Scriven and Matt Salisbury. Tom has made a real breakthrough this year to become a key component in the bowling unit.

"Looking forward, we've got three games left against Sussex, Yorkshire and Durham and if we win all of those we will be in with a shout of promotion, so that's what we will be aiming to do."

Gloucestershire skipper James Bracey:

"We started the game poorly and ended it poorly and that's the story, really.

"We were pretty good in the middle of the game the way we fought back to bowl them out. That was brilliant from a very young attack. It was a great learning curve for the likes of Dom and Luke.

"We started to put together some nice partnerships at times, a couple of 20s and 30s, a couple of 50s and 60s, but when we came under pressure we got out. Sometimes we gave our wickets away, sometimes they just bowled well.

"We're desperate to get a couple of wins on the board before the end of the season. It doesn't help that we keep getting bowlers injured, but if the batters can show there is something about them, hopefully we can put some big scores together and set it up for the bowlers."

Report supplied by ECB Reporters' Network.