Billings’ late dash to no avail as Kent’s promotion hopes are crushed

Northamptonshire 384 (Duckett 208, Wakely 73) and 31 for 0 beat Kent 230 (Dickson 63, Coles 52, Gidman 51) and 184 (Viljoen 63, Kleinveldt 5-53) by ten wicketsScorecard

Around 3am this morning, Sam Billings checked into Kent’s team hotel in Bromley. He had just completed the long drive down from Old Trafford, where he had been 12th man during England’s T20 defeat against Pakistan, and not released until after the game had been completed.

After five hours’ sleep, Billings arrived at Beckenham to prepare himself for the third day of Kent’s Championship match with Northamptonshire. He netted for several hours, readjusting to the red ball after training for several days against the white ball – in vain as it turned out.

At 10.55 this morning, Billings walked out to the crease after the dismissal of Sam Northeast, Kent’s batting totem all season. Kent were 22 for 5 and still trailed by 132 runs. They had to clear that deficit, and add another 200 runs or so, if they were to have a chance of gaining the victory their season depended on. It was time for a returning hero.

Initially, Billings did not seem like one. He edged his very first ball, from the relentlessly probing Ben Sanderson, through the slips, and a couple of other boundaries followed from edges. Yet there were glimpses – a cut off Sanderson, an extra-cover drive off Azharullah – that Billings’ late night drive would be vindicated, and he would be the hero Kent needed.

In the last over before lunch, Billings shaped to drive, and then pulled his bat away: as if he had thought he was playing a T20, only to remind himself at the last split-second that this was a first-class game. The indecision proved fatal: Billings’ did not lift his bat up in time, and the ball took an inside edge to uproot his off stump. As he trudged off, the fate of this game went with him. His efforts had been to no avail.

Kent …

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