Middleton, Fuller chalk off runs to put Hampshire on the board

Hampshire needed just 80 minutes of the final day to complete a five-wicket victory over Nottinghamshire in the Vitality County Championship at Trent Bridge.

Five down overnight - and with Tom Prest likely to bat only in extremis after suffering a shoulder fracture in the field on day one - Hampshire still needed 85 runs to chase down a target of 169 when they resumed, which looked potentially tricky

In the event, Fletcha Middleton and James Fuller built on the foundations laid on Sunday evening to compile an unbroken match-winning partnership of 127. Allrounder Fuller finished 77 not out with opener Middleton unbeaten on 59.

It is Hampshire's first win of the season but their ninth victory in the last 12 Championship matches between themselves and Nottinghamshire and their sixth in seven since they last suffered defeat in 2018

Hampshire finished just behind runners-up Essex in third place in last season's Division One table but have been out of form so far and the 20 points picked up here will come as a relief in what may prove an unforgiving division this year.

A first century of the season by allrounder Lyndon James rescued Nottinghamshire from 50 for 6 in their first innings but - the Middleston-Fuller partnership apart - the key passage of batting in the contest was the 157-run stand between Liam Dawson and Keith Barker for Hampshire's sixth-wicket on Saturday, which enabled the visitors to claim a narrow first-innings lead, despite England's Olly Stone impressing with the ball.

Nottinghamshire's top order again found the going tough at the start of their second innings, losing three wickets before even wiping out the arrears, and though they were bolstered by half-centuries by Joe Clarke and Jack Haynes, the 169-run target left was always going to be difficult to defend, even allowing for more damage inflicted by the new ball.

They gave themselves a chance by reducing Hampshire to 44 for 5 on Sunday evening before Middleton and Fuller weathered the storm, getting through the last eight overs to stumps unscathed.

An early breakthrough looked vital as the last day began under cloudy skies but none of the Nottinghamshire seamers could conjure much out of the pitch and any hope that legspinner Calvin Harrison could turn the contest vanished when he conceded 21 runs in a single over to rush Hampshire towards a win that was finally achieved when Fuller guided a ball from James to the fine leg boundary for his eighth four.