HEAVY and persistent rain forced the Royal London One-Day Cup Group B match between Kent and Essex at Tunbridge Wells to be abandoned without a ball being bowled today.

Bad weather quickly left the outfield saturated and at 12.10pm, umpires Rob Bailey and Billy Taylor decided that there was no chance of play, with the forecast showing no let up in the rain during the afternoon.

Kent and Essex both took a point from the no result.

Essex qualified for the quarter-finals of the NatWest T20Blast without a ball being bowled in the match with Kent at Chelmsford on Friday.

The game was finally called off at 8.25pm after persistent rain fell throughout most of the day.

But Glamorgan’s match against Gloucestershire went ahead as a five-overs per side game and victory for Glamorgan would have denied Essex a place in the last eight.

However, the Welsh county failed to take their last-gasp chance, losing by eight wickets and leaving Essex in fourth place in the South Group.

They will now travel to Edgbaston where they will meet Birmingham.

Essex will be on a revenge mission as they were knocked out of the T20 at the same stage last year when Birmingham won by 19 runs at Chelmsford.

Essex Head coach Paul Grayson said: “We would have preferred to have played and beaten Kent to book our quarter-final place but I am still happy that we have made it through.

“After our poor start in the competition when we lost four of our opening five matches, to have reached the quarter-finals is something that we have to be happy with no matter how it was achieved.”

Umpire Paul Baldwin paid tribute to the efforts of the Essex ground staff to get a game played.

“They worked extremely hard to try and get the game on but were beaten by the weather,” he said.

“As umpires, we have to take into account the ground conditions as regards the credibility of the competition. We explained that to both captains and they were in total agreement.”