Kent were left battling for a draw, after three days of their of the LV= Insurance County Championship match with Hampshire at Canterbury.

The hosts are on 66 for no loss in their second innings, trailing by 212, with Zak Crawley unbeaten on 35 and Ben Compton 30 not out.

Earlier Liam Dawson hit 84, Joe Weatherly 58 and James Fuller 51 as the visitors posted 373 in their first innings.

Kent had started well, with Wes Agar taking three early wickets to help reduce Hampshire to 159 for five, but after riding out a torrid opening session the visitors kicked on after lunch and took a 278-run lead.

After day two had been reduced to a rump of just 6.1 overs, the weather finally improved on Saturday morning, with Hampshire resuming on 103 for nought.

Having been dismissed for just 95 in their first innings, Kent came roaring back into the contest, with Agar striking twice in the third over over of the day.

Fletcha Middleton was first to go, edging behind for 48 and handing Jordan Cox his first red-ball dismissal as a wicket-keeper. Agar then produced an absolute jaffa that sent Nick Gubbins’ off-stump cartwheeling.

He then had Weatherley lbw, but was denied a fourth victim when Zak Crawley dropped Ben Brown, although the batter failed to cash in, adding just a single before he was lbw to Grant Stewart for 10.

A far-from-gruntled James Vince was given lbw to Michael Hogan for 24 and Hampshire endured a spell of 7.4 overs without scoring.

Ian Holland took 36 balls to get off the mark, although when he did it was a stylish cut off Joey Evison for four and he and Dawson survived to reach 189 for five at lunch.

From then on the visitors dominated and as the runs came in torrents the home desperation was summed up when an lbw appeal was turned down and a fan yelled: “Come on you … ” before realising the entire ground could hear him. Thinking better of swearing, he meekly added the word … “umpire,” to widespread laughter.

A potentially crucial stand of 94 was ended in emphatic fashion when Evison splayed Holland’s stumps for 41, but by then the momentum was entirely with Hampshire.

It was 308 for six at tea and Dawson continued to hit out until he holed out to Hamid Qadri and was caught at mid-wicket by Tawanda Muyeye.

Kyle Abbott was lbw to Evision for 2 before Fuller tried to sweep a full toss from Qadri and was caught on the boundary by Muyeye.

When Barker clubbed Evison to Muyeye for 25 it left Kent with a hazardous 26 overs to survive until stumps.

Dawson put down a tough chance to catch Ben Compton off Mohammad Abbas, but the openers batted through until failing light forced Hampshire to bring on their spinners for the final five overs and neither Dawson nor Weatherley was able to break through.

Hampshire’s Liam Dawson said: “Without a doubt I’m pleased to get some runs. I’ve probably been below the standards I set myself this summer so far. It’s been frustrating. I put a lot of work in the last month and haven’t seen the rewards, so it was nice to get some runs today.

“My method was to try and bat as many balls as I could and not really worry about scoring because I’ve been getting out so early in the previous innings. It was purely about trying to spend time in the middle and improve my defences. They’ve not been good enough this summer so far.

“I’ve been getting out way too early in my innings and it was a really conscious effort in my innings today and my training to try and nullify that. Luckily today it came off.

“I think after tea we were going to bat for 16 overs and then bowl at them. The spinner came on, mid on was up and I tried to hit it there and I dragged it to mid-wicket. I was a little but disappointed but we’re in a god position.

“It was a little bit disappointing we didn’t get a wicket, but we’ve gone into final days needing to bat all to win the game and it’s not a nice place to be when you can’t win the game. We’ve got to come back tomorrow and be prepared to play all day to get those ten wickets.

“I think the game here last year we couldn’t et a wicket on the third night and we ended up winning just after tea on day so that’ll be the aim for tomorrow. We’ve got the bowling attack to do it.”

Kent’s Wes Agar said: “I guess it was a different kind of day today. You take five wickets in the first session and then they came back well and put together good partnerships on a wicket that slowed up a fair bit and made it difficult for us.

“We were happy with the way we bowled today, we had a chart. We realised we couldn’t change (what had happened) and we set that tone. Yes we would have liked to have got more wickets in that second session and continued it but I think we fought well and then for the boys at the back end there to fight hard and give us a platform for tomorrow is a positive.

“I think at times you can get caught into trying to do too much and thinking ‘What can I do to get those wickets’ so for me it was about literally about going back to simplicity, hitting that same spot as much as I could.

“I found it difficult early from that top end with the slope, getting my line so I had a good chat with my bowling coach, discussed my lines and where I needed to be and I thought I rectified it quite well in that first session.

“Zak and Ben are class players and it gives us a great platform to bat on tomorrow. Obviously with the rai around and everything it’s going to be hard to fight for a win, but it’s little wins in this situation.”