HAMPSHIRE captain Jimmy Adams admitted his side has to be more ruthless after slipping to the bottom of the LV County Championship’s first division.

After a third draw in five games, Hampshire are still looking for their first win in the top flight, following promotion last season.

Hampshire missed the chance to press home their advantage against Championship leaders Middlesex on the penultimate day, when a last-wicket partnership of 75 limited the home side to a first-innings lead of 51.

It meant they never had a realistic chance of winning when they began the final day on 4-0. Hands were shaken at the earliest opportunity on Wednesday evening, with Hampshire 185-5.

Hampshire have already played five of their 16 Championship games, but only a point separates the bottom four.

Adams said: “We need a win, that would change things so much - not just table wise but it would give us the belief that we can take hold of important periods and drive home those advantages.

“The nice thing is we’ve got ourselves into positions where we feel we’re one wicket or a good session with the bat away from being ahead of the game.

“So far we haven’t quite managed to take those. We’re well aware of that but we’ve got to keep creating them and if we take one we could be in a good place.

“We’ve got to improve but there’s no worry there.”

Hampshire can at least take some confidence from accruing more points (11) than unbeaten Middlesex (ten) over four days at The Ageas Bowl.

“We're pretty happy with how the game went as a whole,” said Adams. “We had a good chance to have a decent first-innings lead that we weren’t able to follow through and a couple of partnerships towards the end of their innings took the fizz out of the last day which is a shame.

“There was nothing to play for and they were well disciplined. The wicket offered a wee bit but we were never able to get far ahead enough to think about doing anything.

“Sometimes things happen out of the blue that change the course of a game but we lost too much time to rain.

“It was tough for the batters against the new ball but then the game petered out.”

Adams followed his first-innings 61 (150 balls) with a 115-ball 37 on the final day before declaring with Hampshire five down and 236 ahead, Michael Carberry having top scored with a patient 57.

“I couldn’t get my rhythm going, the wicket didn’t seem to have the consistency of some of the wickets here, but it made for a decent game of cricket,” added Adams. “It would have been interesting if we’d had a full four days but it wasn’t to be. Both sides will be reasonably content with the result.”

Hampshire are level on points with Worcestershire, who have a game in hand and are the next Championship visitors to the Ageas Bowl on May 31.