Kent coach Matt Walker has been reflecting on his side’s stunning historic weekend win in the Bob Willis Trophy against Sussex at the Spitfire Ground.

The innings and twenty-five run victory saw records galore fall in the Canterbury sunshine.

Jordan Cox and Jack Leaning both scored their maiden double centuries in their fledgling careers and the unbroken second wicket stand of 423 (across 95 overs) and Cox’s unbeaten 238 is the highest individual score ever by a Kent batsman against Sussex.

The nineteen year old broke several records during his 570 ball innings with 47 fours and three sixes, whilst Leaning – who was making his Kent debut at Canterbury following his move from Yorkshire – scored 220 not out from 345 balls with twenty-nine boundaries during their stand which was just short of six and a half hours.

The victory secured inside three days was also just the forty-third time in the game’s history that a side has won a two innings game by losing just a single wicket!

“It’s one of those strange games that went to plan,” Walker admitted. “We weren’t quite right first innings with the ball with a bit of rustiness for a couple of the bowlers who were playing their first games, but overall I thought it was an excellent game of cricket and how well we played – it’s just one of those freak games really which is difficult to get your head around as they don’t happen very often.”

“It was great to see two players get big hundreds and great to walk away with full points.”

“We’ve had two very different games to start our campaign. I said when we spoke after the Essex game that I thought we played some really good cricket at Chelmsford and we weren’t far away – just a session away from winning that game – but we learned another tough lesson about taking opportunities both individually and as a team.”

Reflecting on the record breaking weekend at Canterbury, the coach told us, “We talked about being ruthless and relentless and when you’ve got a team on the ropes absolutely hammering home your advantage – and we then do all that against Sussex.”

“When you see a performance like that, it makes you so pleased and satisfied that the lessons from last week have been quickly learned. I do think if I’m honest that we were a bit off with the ball in the first innings and didn’t quite get it right – we felt that there was enough in the wicket to certainly bowl them out for forty or fifty less than we did in the end, but it was a good wicket.”

“So in the end we thought the final figure of 320 was OK, but when we batted… you don’t often see that. It was just grinding to the best possible level that you could ever see from two county players – getting in; recognising the situation; recognising the opportunity in front of you; judging the conditions pretty quickly and then using them for a very good tempo throughout both the innings for Jordan and Jack – they didn’t come out of their bubble once really, they just played their games and “just” built a partnership that went on and on… and on.”

“We talk about batsmen scoring big hundreds – “daddy” hundreds – and they did that and then some, and that is taking their chance and really put yourself in a really good condition. 520, or whatever it was in the end, in a hundred and twenty overs was… well you’d take that any day of the week.”

“You’re not going to get six hundred plus in one hundred and twenty overs or it’s very unlikely but to get ourselves in that position where we had a two hundred run lead was brilliant and the two lads just took their opportunity to score really big hundreds.”

Walker then conceded that the way the side – led by bowlers Darren Stevens and Harry Podmore – approached defending the lead that Cox and Leaning had given them almost left the coach speechless as he told us, “the way we bowled second innings was nothing short of brilliant!”

“There was a lot of talk around a flat wicket after seeing us score all those runs, and some thought it would be the same when we were bowling, but the skill level and the attitude and energy from ball one was great and to get a wicket in the first over set the tone, and we never looked back.”

“We got wickets early and just kept applying the pressure. Stevo bowled absolutely beautifully, Podders was back to somewhere near his best and that’s the template to play first class cricket.”

“Overall it really was a great game to be involved in!”