From a position of difficulty at the end of the second day, Leicestershire fought back to finish the third day with a slight edge over Hampshire at Grace Road.

Michael Bevan and Neil Burns held the Hampshire bowlers at bay, after a throw by John Francis just failed to run out the Aussie star in the second over of the day. The pair batted through to lunch, upping the abysmal scoring rate of the previous day.

After posting the century partnership Bevan received a superb ball from Chris Tremlett, but this only brought in the veteran Philip deFreitas and with his new partner began to play the now tired Hampshire attack to all parts.

Burns reached a creditable century with his 13th boundary, but on his dismissal to a slip catch off Mullally, the innings folded, and on reaching 300 with two tail enders at the crease, stand in captain Ian Sutcliffe declared 11 runs behind.

Will Kendall received a corker from deFreitas, and was soon followed by John Crawley for a rare duck, as Hampshire began their 2nd Innings badly. After some fine strokes particularly off his legs, Giles White was given out lbw, giving deFreitas 3 early wickets.

Robin Smith and Neil Johnson rallied and shared a half century stand, but with rain falling Johnson was adjudged to have been caught by the wicket-keeper down the leg side off Crowe, a decision that was treated with dismay, especially as the teams then followed the disgruntled batsman off the field for the same shower of rain.

After a 20 minute stoppage, Smith and John Francis survived with any further scare to leave Hampshire 113 ahead with 6 wickets in hand.

© Hampshire Cricket