Kent have confirmed the players who got them to the Royal London One-Day Cup final will be the ones given the opportunity to lead them to glory.
The Darren Stevens-inspired Spitfires won their semi-final on Tuesday, beating Hampshire by three wickets. Several key Kent players - and head coach Matt Walker - have missed their run to the final as they have been playing in The Hundred.
That competition will have finished by the time Kent’s showdown at Trent Bridge against Lancashire takes place on Saturday, September 17, but the likes of captain Sam Billings, Jordan Cox, Jack Leaning, Daniel Bell-Drummond and Matt Milnes are all still expected to miss out on a Kent place for the final. “Kent’s Director of Cricket, Paul Downton, has today confirmed that the squad for Kent Spitfires’ Royal London Cup final against Lancashire will be chosen from the same pool of players available to Kent during the group and knock-out stages of the tournament,” a Kent statement released on Thursday read. “This is a unanimous decision made by the club’s coaching staff and men’s captain Sam Billings. “The group of players available for Kent so far has won what have effectively been five knock-out matches in a row, playing some excellent cricket, and [they] fully deserve their opportunity to represent Kent in a domestic final.” In the absence of Billings, they have been skippered by Joe Denly.
Alex Blake, meanwhile, injured a finger in Kent’s semi-final win but he is due to resume training soon and could yet be fit to play in the final.