Batsman Heino Kuhn insists that Kent can still win the County Championship despite their slow start to the season.

Kent have lost two of their first three matches after Lancashire completed victory by an innings and five runs at Canterbury on Sunday.

But the 37-year-old South African believes Kent can turn their red ball campaign around, starting with Thursday’s clash against Glamorgan at Cardiff.

“We can still win this competition,” said Kuhn. “It’s a long way away but we have to start this week – we can’t wait any longer. We can’t make the same mistakes again.

“Walks (Matt Walker) and the coaching staff are very positive, you have to mention when there is a pattern happening and there are negatives but we’re looking forward.

“I’m sure that come Thursday we would have worked at (our game) and be better at it.

“We can’t fall too much behind. They’re all good sides so we need a win, and by getting that first win you get your season on the go.”

After deciding to field first, Kent had Lancashire 248-7 late on the opening day at Canterbury – only for the visitors to put on 187 for the eighth wicket as centuries by Luke Wood and Danny Lamb saw them reach 525 all out.

Kent were then skittled out for 169 early on day three and despite runs from openers Jordan Cox and Daniel Bell-Drummond second time around, they lost wickets in two devastating spells on day four to seal their fate.

Bell-Drummond’s return to form will no doubt prove particularly welcome as he scored his first red-ball century since 2019 and his first as an opener since 2016.

“We’re very disappointed, each and every one of us,” said Kuhn.

“It was one of those games that we wanted to win but they played a lot better than us so all the credit must go to them. They outplayed us in 90 per cent of the game.

“It was a decent batting deck, very slow, but no real demons in there. They were persistent and consistent on their plans.

“After 169 all out in the first innings to get to 209-1 on day three was a great effort from Daniel Bell-Drummond and Jordan Cox. They got us into a very good position and then we lost wickets in clusters that didn’t help (on day four).

“I thought our bowlers did well on day one and there were good runs from Jordan and Daniel. The thing for us now is to get everything together, get big partnerships with the batting and when we have a team 230-odd for seven, then we need to be ruthless.”

There were one or two questionable umpiring decisions on the final day with Kuhn and Zak Crawley both adjudged leg before to deliveries that seemed to be sliding well down the leg side.

Kuhn refused to be drawn on it but admitted: “I don’t think we batted well enough in the first innings so there’s no use us moaning about a couple of dismissals. We should be better, we didn’t score enough runs in the first innings and we didn’t bowl well enough on day two.

“It’s early on in the season. We all know we can come back from it and we’re looking forward to Glamorgan.

“We’ll take the positives out of the game and work on the negatives, we’re still upbeat and ready to go for the next game.”

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