Yorkshire managed only 42 minutes' play on the final day of their County Championship match against Hampshire at the Rose Bowl, but it was sufficient for them to stop losing a precious point and for their promotion rivals to gain one.

When the rain ceased and allowed a brief passage of play in the afternoon, Hampshire resumed their first innings on 202 for six in reply to Yorkshire's 395.

On the previous day, Yorkshire had bowled their overs so slowly that they were two overs behind the required rate and they knew that unless they could make them up they would have a point docked.

So they pushed spinners Richard Dawson and Andy Gray straight into the attack with the result that ten overs were bowled in half-an-hour to get them up to speed again.

But Hampshire's seventh wicket pair of Nic Pothas and Shaun Udal made rapid progress during this time.

Udal smacked a six off each bowler and when Udal was bowled by Gray for 41, the home side had moved on to 253 to pick up another batting bonus point.

England paceman Matthew Hoggard was thrown the ball and in his second over he got one to rear sharply off a length and Pothas edged to Dawson at first slip.

Hampshire were 259 for eight and Yorkshire wanted just one more wicket for a third bowling point but before the new batsmen could walk in it started to rain again and the match had to be abandoned.

Yorkshire took ten points from the game and Hampshire nine and the sides remain in fourth and third respectively in the table.

Yorkshire director of cricket David Byas was convinced that his team would have won the match if almost half of it had not fallen foul of the weather

"I thought we bossed the play for most of the time and I was impressed with the way some of our youngsters performed," he said.

"Phil Jaques' double century was a monumental effort, but he was very well supported by the other batsmen."

Updated: 10:03 Monday, June 28, 2004