There were 36.1 overs remaining when Kent duly completed their second championship win of the season at a sun- drenched Sophia Gardens.
Needing 195 to win, they paced their run chase perfectly with their South African Kolpak signing Heino Kuhn top scoring with an undefeated 69.
They would have been on their way home to Canterbury earlier, had not play been been delayed by 100 minutes due to a leak caused by the underground drainage system which caused a damp patch at the edge of the pitch.
Glamorgan’s last pair added just a single to their overnight score before Matt Henry had Michael Hogan caught at third slip, giving the New Zealand pace bowler match figures of 8/90, and taking his season’s tally to 27.
The pitch had flattened out considerably since 19 wickets fell on the opening day, and the Kent openers Daniel Bell Drummond and Sean Dickson laid the foundation with an opening partnership of 77 in 22 overs.
Both batsmen played some handsome drives through the off- side and there was only one”play and miss” in the first 21 overs. Bell-Drummond contributed 36 to the opening partnership before he was leg before to the persevering Timm Van Der Gugten- his eighth victim of the game.
Dickson was the next to go when he also went leg before to Marchant De Lange, the Kent opener becoming the 14th LBW victim in the game.
Kuhn soon made his intentions clear with a flurry of boundaries, although Andrew Salter’s off spin commanded respect and he almost had Kuhn prodding to short leg in his third over.
Kuhn reached a rapid half century from only 49 balls, with a large proportion of his runs -40- coming from boundaries. His captain Joe Denly also played with ease, once lifting Salter over long -on for six as Kent’s third wicket paid closed in on their target.
Kuhn and Denly had put on 71 at four runs an over, before Denly, aiming for his second six over long-on, was brilliantly caught by the substitute fielder Tom Cullen, Glamorgan’s reserve wicketkeeper, who dived to his left and held on to take the catch inches from the ground and the boundary rope.
With two runs required, Zak Crawley became yet another LBW victim, before Darren Stevens scored the winning runs to give Kent a well- earned victory.
Kent’s Matthew Walker was: “very pleased with the win, probably the best win I’ve been involved with. It’s difficult to gauge where you are after the low scoring games, but we are getting better and we showed here that when the pitches improve- as this one did today, our batters also improve. Our bowling has been excellent, and I was delighted how all our seamers performed in this game.”