Ruler of Aotearoa, Lord of Sussex ... King Rossco

You know those days at school when a bunch of your class are away doing some sort of activity, leaving a few of you with a chill teacher on a Friday afternoon? Easily one of the better classroom experiences any child/teenager can enjoy as you do zero work, play some sort of game or just whack ya feet up on the desk. Yeah, well that's what the Kiwi County Tour now feels like as the Blackcaps are gearing up to take down Zimbabwe, leaving only the real hardcore Kiwi County Tour battlers left.

We did get a final Ross Taylor appearance though...

Kent vs Sussex

Tom Latham gapped Kent before he got the chance to face off in what would have been an intriguing battle between he and Sussex's Ross Taylor, thankfully Taylor stayed around for a few extra days and as Matt Henry did, Taylor threw a farewell shin-dig. Kent were first up to bat and hit 575, with Taylor snaring a few catches and four Kent batsmen scoring half-centuries while there was also a big ol' 190 on what must have been a pretty flat deck.

Sussex could only manage 333 in response but guess who hit 142!? King Rossco, you already know. Taylor actually finished 142* as his lower order crumbled and Taylor hit 13 boundaries in the process with a six thrown in for good measure.

Kent enforced the follow-on and this was glorious news for Taylor as he got another net session against Kent seamer Kagiso Rabada - who will likely feature for South Africa in Tests against Taylor's Blackcaps in a few weeks. Taylor hit 68 off 89 balls in the second innings, with a strike-rate of 76.40 compared to his first innings strike-rate of 56.80.

A draw was the end result as Sussex were left 255/5 in their follow-on and everyone went back to the pub for beers, courtesy of King Rossco.

Ross Taylor: 142*, 62.

Glamorgan v Derbyshire

Glamorgan hosted Derbyshire and you can expect Derbyshire to feature heavily on the Kiwi County Tour from this point on as both Hamish Rutherford and Neil Broom will play out the rest of the season. Broom's Blackcaps career is almost definitely over, but Rutherford will be an interesting bloke to follow as he's still very much in the mix for a Test opening spot and needs to stack up runs to demand selection.

After Glamorgan hit 518 in their first innings, Rutherford and Broom both failed to deliver with Rutherford out caught-behind for 26 and Broom also caught-behind for 9. This wasn't too bad considering that Derbyshire were dismissed for 177 and it got a wee bit better in the second dig with Rutherford hitting 45 while Broom was trapped lbw for 3. A wee bit better, again some context needs to be applied though as two of Derbryshire's top-six batsmen hit centuries and another hit 90 as Derbyshire reached 536, setting Glamorgan 196 to win.

Glamorgan snatched the win, hitting 200/6 in 45.4 overs.

Hamish Rutherford: 26, 45.

Neil Broom: 9, 3.

Gloucestershire vs Leicestershire

Unfortunately we had another loss on the Kiwi County Tour as there was no Kieran Noema-Barnett, for Gloucs, leaving Hamish Marshall to hold things down. Marshall hit 19, before being bowled with Gloucestershire dismissed for 183 in their first innings and Leicestershire then took a cheeky lead, all out for 218 with Marshall taking 2 catches.

Marshall's poor form in 4-day cricket continued though as he could only manage 6 as Gloucs hit 215 in their second effort. In his past four innings' Marshall has scores of; 10, 0, 19 and 6.
Leicestershire only had to chase 181 to win and did so fairly easily, reaching the target in 54.3 overs and only 4 wickets down.

Hamish Marshall: 19, 6.