An interesting final day looks to be on the cards at Tunbridge Wells, where Kent lead Notts by 319 runs.
The hosts had the better of the third day of the Specsavers County Championship meeting by bowling Notts out for 267 and then they reached 277-3 when bad light forced an early finish.
Samit Patel was one of the six Notts batsmen to be dismissed on the third morning, although he did make 52, his first championship half-century of the summer.
“Obviously I’ve been doing the work in the nets and not getting the results in the middle, so that has been a little bit frustrating,” he said.
Kent built up a healthy advantage in warm sultry conditions, with Joe Denly and Daniel Bell-Drummond putting on 152 together during the afternoon. Patel reflected that it had been a lot gloomier and damper when his side had batted earlier.
“We’ve had the back end of the conditions so far in this match,” he said. “We’ve had to bat in on-off conditions and it was dark, so I thought we batted pretty well on a sporting wicket. But then when the sun comes out it is a different wicket.
“I’ve thought I’ve played pretty well in the first innings but we’ve got some work to do in the second. It will be an interesting day.”
Denly enhanced his Ashes prospects with an unbeaten 111 and hardly offered Notts a glimmer of a chance.
“Joe batted excellently,” said Patel. “And it showed how good he is and he took the game away from us. It’s always hard when you’re trying to force it and they got away from us a little bit but the bad light at the end makes sure they’ll have to bat on for a bit on the morning and it will take some overs out of the game
“Then we’ll see. If we can get two people in maybe we can knock them off.”
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