County Championship: Nervous times for Kent as Lancashire's openers take match into fourth day

Lancashire openers Keaton Jennings (left) and Luke Wells scored half-centuries to take Kent into a fourth day

Kent's future in Division One of the County Championship hung in the balance on Thursday night after Lancashire reached 126 without loss in their second innings to trail by 41 runs.

Joe Denly's 136 had helped Kent to 494, a first-innings lead of 167, but any hopes of a quick three-day victory faded when Luke Wells and Keaton Jennings both made half-centuries in an unbroken opening partnership, reaching 69 and 52 not out respectively before bad light halted play at the Spitfire Ground.

Although Kent hauled in seven bonus points, they need to at least match Middlesex's result against Nottinghamshire or they will be relegated and with that game also looking too close to call, a gut-wrenching final day is in the offing.

Kent had begun day three in a significantly happier place than they had been 24 hours earlier, on 345-4 on day two in reply to Lancashire's first innings score of 327 and with Denly unbeaten on 105.

The first cheer of the morning came when Tom Bailey bowled a no ball, taking Kent to 350 and securing the sixth bonus point, which meant that as long as Kent did no worse than Middlesex they would stay in Division One.

The partnership between Denly and Harry Finch had reached exactly 150 when the latter was bowled for 44 by George Balderson.

Lancashire's attack was already weakened by the absence of Jack Blatherwick, who had bowled two beamers in an over on day two, and their discipline continued to waver.

Tom Hartley, in for Will Williams, bowled the third beamer of the innings, a head-high slow delivery that Denly swatted for six to take Kent past 400. In the next over, the 108th, Balderson bowled a no ball, bringing up a half-century of extras.

Denly finally went when he was lbw to Balderson, and Hartley bowled Joey Evison for 12, exposing the tail.

Balderson sent Nathan Gilchrist's middle-stump cartwheeling for a 10-ball duck, but Aron Nijjar and Matt Quinn took Kent to 447-8 at lunch.

Quinn was on 22 when he was caught off a Bailey no-ball, but he was caught behind two deliveries later without adding to his score.

Nijjar, however, hit the next ball for six and had made 42 before he holed out to Bailey and was caught by Blatherwick, ending the innings.

At that point the most optimistic scenario was a victory inside three days, but Lancashire's openers Wells and Jennings had raced to 55 without loss when an early tea was taken due to a brief shower and by then the mood around the Spitfire Ground was beginning to darken again.

Kent supporters have already seen this film too many times this season - hefty first-innings leads were squandered against Surrey and Nottinghamshire, and the openers eroded the deficit offering barely a chance.

When Yuzvendra Chahal did find Jennings' edge he was dropped by Jack Leaning when he was on 42 and bad light stopped play with 11 overs remaining, at precisely the moment the news came through that Middlesex had bowled out Nottinghamshire for a first-innings deficit of 18.

Report supplied by ECB Reporters' Network.