Kent Cricket chief executive Jamie Clifford remains hopeful that winless Kent can salvage their season and launch an unlikely push for promotion.

At the midway stage in LV= County Championship Division 2, Kent are second bottom with six draws and two defeats from their eight games.

However, Mr Clifford insisted that “anything could happen” and said it would be wrong for under pressure Kent to concede defeat in their aim to win promotion at this stage of the season – despite their joint longest winless streak to begin a season and worst since 1972.

He admitted: “Of course there’s pressure on us – there’s pressure in sport when you’re not getting results, although I have to say, we have been playing pretty well in phases.

“We’ve always said that we’d like to compete for honours in all forms of the game and nothing has changed in that respect.

“A lot of the pressure on us is self-imposed. We made bold statements and made no secret of the fact at the start of the season, one of our key aims was to win promotion in the championship, which is a big part of our season.

“It’s important that we get things right. We want the second half of the season to be as competitive as possible.”

Mr Clifford added: “You’ve seen a lot goes into half a cricket season and there is a lot more cricket to come. Anything can happen. Until our hopes of promotion are dead, everyone will keep working hard.

“If we were losing games and rolling over without a fight, then I’d certainly be worried but the fight is there, the individual performances have been there, we just need to put it all together to start winning games.”