WILL Tavare insists the future is bright for Gloucestershire after his century helped them finish the County Championship season with an emphatic 244-run win against Kent at Canterbury.

The 24-year-old scored 105 in the second innings against the county where his uncle, former England batsman Chris Tavare, made his name to surpass the milestone of 1,000 first class runs in his debut season.

Alex Gidman also hit 140 on his last appearance for Gloucestershire to put them in a commanding position with their total of 432 setting Kent an unlikely 448 to win.

The visitors, minus the departing Will Gidman, dismissed Kent for 203, mopping up their final five wickets inside a session for only 32 runs to bank 19 points and leapfrog Glamorgan to finish seventh in Division Two.

Tavare believes the performance gives Gloucestershire plenty of encouraging signs to take into the long winter break and admitted he exceeded his own expectations this season with the amount of runs he scored.

He said: “It’s not something I thought about at the start of the season. My main aim was simply to establish myself in the side.

“Having entered county cricket at a relatively late age, I guess it means even more to me. I have enjoyed every moment of playing with a great set of lads and I’m sure we can look forward to the future with optimism.”

“The other bowlers have stepped up to the plate and, with Will (Gidman) leaving, that augurs really well for next season.”

"I got a text message of congratulation from my uncle (Chris Tavare) after my hundred. Most of my family come from Kent and they've all been at the game at some point, which has been really great.

"To think Chris played something like 200 matches here almost scares me. So for me to come here and score a hundred on the ground where my dad played as a kid, my uncles played, and where my granddad used to cycle for over an hour just to come and watch, meant a great deal to me."

Kent, having dominated the opening session of the match to have Gloucestershire reeling on 62-8, lost every session thereafter.

Tailenders Craig Miles (48) and David Payne (54) put on 90 to help Gloucestershire recover to 179 and then took 3-20 and 2-35 respectively as Kent slumped to 164 all out.

Gloucestershire took the game away from Kent in their second innings, despite David Griffiths taking 6-63, and a career-best 4-35 from Tom Smith wrapped up the win.

Already in trouble going into the last day on an overnight score of 95-4, Kent performed more admirably at first as Darren Stevens and acting skipper Sam Northeast dug in.

The fifth-wicket partners looked untroubled in adding 98 in 28.1 overs until Stevens, three short of a half-century that would probably have made sure of his winning the PCA's £10,000 first prize for winning the FTI-sponsored Most Valuable Player of the Season award - promptly got himself out.

Leaning back to cut the seemingly innocuous slow left-arm spin of Smith, the Kent right-hander simply steered a catch to Hamish Marshall and, after pausing in a moment of disbelief, sloped off shaking his head.

Northeast, fresh from centuries in his last three County Championship games against Essex, Glamorgan and Hampshire, continued to look in prime form as he posted his fifth half-century of the summer from 98 balls and with seven fours.

He lost his sixth-wicket partner Calum Haggett just before the scheduled lunch break, however, when the left-hander turned a bat-pad catch to short leg to give Smith his second scalp of the session.

Northeast's purple patch came to an end four overs later when, in attempting to leg glance Liam Norwell's second ball of the day, he found an unlucky inside edge through to Gloucestershire wicketkeeper Gareth Roderick.

In his next over Norwell uprooted the off stump of Mitch Claydon (six) and, with Kent staring down the barrel of defeat on 187 for eight, delayed the lunch break.

Tail-ender Griffiths blotted his copybook with a wild slog across the line to lose his off stump.

Then Gloucestershire duly wrapped up their fourth win of the campaign when James Tredwell chipped meekly to wide mid on to give Smith slightly flattering figures.