Kent captain Jack Leaning has urged his batsmen to stand up and be counted as they look for a great escape against Warwickshire in their LV= Insurance County Championship Division 1 game at Canterbury.

The visitors dominated for a second successive day, extending their lead to 378 after declaring at 549-7 in reply to Kent’s paltry 171 all out. The hosts were reduced to 55-1 in reply by the close and have two days to save themselves from a seemingly inevitable defeat.

Leaning said: “We’ve got two big days coming ahead. We’ll try and bat for as long as we can, hopefully we’ll go past them and see where we end up.

“Credit to them, they’ve just showed us how to bat on a good wicket. Ultimately we’ve put ourselves behind in the game by how we’ve batted on day one, not necessarily because of how we’ve bowled.

“If we’re being totally honest with ourselves we should have been doing that to them on a good wicket, but look we’ve found ourselves where we’ve seen a lot of runs scored on this ground in the last few weeks so it’s our turn to stand up as a batting unit and be counted.

“There was a bit of spin on offer there but credit to them again, they’ve played nicely. Yates played a wonderful innings and showed what a bit of patience and application can do.

“I can’t fault the bowlers’ efforts and workload. They’ve given me everything I’ve asked from them and that’s been the case all season.”

Warwickshire’s Rob Yates hit his highest first-class score of 228 not out from 421 balls, with 23 fours and a six, having batted for nearly nine hours. Australia’s Glenn Maxwell made 81 in his first championship appearance for four years and Henry Brookes was unbeaten on 52 as the visitors dominated.

Chris Rushworth bowled Tawanda Muyeye early in Kent’s second innings and although Ben Compton and Joe Denly survived till the close, the hosts are still 323 behind with two days remaining.

Warwickshire began the day on 155-2 and they’d nudged into a three-run lead when Sam Hain edged Arshdeep Singh and fell to a diving catch by Jordan Cox for 32.

Jacob Bethell immediately went on the attack, clubbing Hamid Qadri for a six that flew into the gardens on the Old Dover Road side of the ground.

Leaning gave Kent brief hope with two wickets in five balls. Bethell was out for 31, caught by a back-pedalling Arshdeep at deep mid-on for 31 and Ed Barnard went for a four-ball duck, narrowly surviving an lbw shout off the third ball he faced before getting caught behind.

But Yates and Maxwell then put on a stand of 124, the former reached three figures when he cut Arshdeep to third man and the lead was exactly a hundred at lunch.

Maxwell looked set for a quickfire ton, but he was caught behind chasing a wide delivery from Matt Quinn for 81 in just 67 balls, though with the lead already past the 200 mark there was little celebration either in the middle or on the boundary.

The most dramatic moment of the afternoon session came when Yates hit Qadri for a six that ended up smashing a glass panel on the balcony of the Kent dressing room.

Yates cruised past his previous highest score of 141 with a straight-driven four off Grant Stewart and it was 442-6 at tea.

Michael Burgess was subsequently out for 42, caught off Quinn by Harry Finch at backward point but Yates survived a major scare when he was on 199, chipping a ball from Qadri just out of reach of three fielders, before he drove the next ball through the covers to pass 200.

The declaration came as soon as Brookes had creamed Leaning for six to reach his half-century, leaving Kent with 14 overs to survive to the close.

Muyeye lasted just five balls before Rushworth sent his off stump flying and although Denly and Compton made it to the close on 29 and 17 respectively, Kent will need something approaching a miracle over the next two days to avoid defeat.