Ross Taylor admitted Sussex almost let victory slip away after beating Kent in nailbiting fashion in the NatWest T20 Blast at Hove.

Taylor top scored with 62 as the Sharks chased down Kent’s total of 140 with three balls to spare to make it three wins out of four and climb to second in the south group.

Tymal Mills and Chris Jordan both took three wickets to restrict the Spitfires to what initially looked a straightforward total to chase in front of a packed house.

But Sussex were indebted to Taylor for marshalling their innings before David Wiese hit consecutive fours in the final over to get the Sharks over the line.

Taylor said: “Any time you are only chasing 140 it is quite easy to think it is a game you are always going to win but you have got to give credit to Kent as they came at us hard.

“When you are chasing a slightly smaller total it gives you a bit of time to get yourself in and I just thought if we could bat 20 overs then we would get there. It was a bit too close for comfort but it was nice to get over the line at the end.

“It was important to win after losing our last two games in the 50-over competition as you don’t want to lose three in a row. This should give us a bit of confidence going into our next game on Sunday.”

Sussex were probably second favourites on 88-4 with five overs to go but Taylor hit the next three balls off James Tredwell for 14 runs to swing the match back towards the Sharks.

He hit another six off Claydon and got the equation down to 12 off the final two overs before holing out at long-off having scored his seventh half century for Sussex in his last 12 innings.

Jordan also fell in the penultimate over from Claydon which went for just four runs to leave Sussex needing eight runs from the last over.

Wiese held his nerve, however, as he hit David Griffiths for consecutive fours to the delight of the Hove crowd.

Taylor said: “I tried to target an over a couple of times but we kept losing wickets at crucial times. I wanted to get the run-rate under ten so it was important to have a big over.

“Mitch Claydon did well to bring them back into the game but David Wiese is an international player and didn’t freeze in that final over.”