Gloucestershire supporters are today celebrating after their club won promotion back to Division One of the County Championship for the first time for 14 years.

It was confirmed that they will be playing top-flight four-day cricket in 2020 after Glamorgan’s game at Durham was abandoned because of bad weather.

Glamorgan were the only team who could have overhauled Gloucestershire going into the final round of matches although it was always a long shot because the Welsh club were 16 points adrift of Chris Dent’s side before a ball was bowled on Monday.

Gloucestershire therefore finished the season in third spot, behind champions Lancashire and Northamptonshire, after their game against Northamptonshire at Bristol was abandoned as a draw.

There was at least some play on day three yesterday with Gloucestershire advancing from 80-6 to 220-7 before the heavens opened again.

A seventh-wicket partnership of 151 between Ben Charlesworth and Graeme van Buuren steered Gloucestershire into calmer waters after their day one difficulties.

Charlesworth, who is still only 18, made an unbeaten 77, a season’s best, while van Buuren made 93, which was also a season’s best.

Van Buuren’s innings lifted him up to third in the county’s batting averages although he was a long way behind Ryan Higgins and Chris Dent – Gloucestershire’s standout batting duo - in terms of number of runs scored.

Dent led the way with 1,087 runs at 47.26 and the shame for Higgins was that there wasn’t a second innings against Northamptonshire which would have given him the chance to reach 1,000 runs as well.

As it was he still had an outstanding season – what a great couple of years he’s had since joining the club from Middlesex – as he scored 958 runs at 59.88.

And that’s before you consider his seam bowling which saw him take 50 wickets at 23.64.

David Payne was the other standout bowler – 43 wickets at 25.88 – but Gloucestershire’s bowlers hunted as a pack all season with Josh Shaw taking 30 wickets and Matt Taylor 29.

Higgins is still only 24 and has certainly grabbed his chance at a club where young players are given every chance to flourish by head coach Richard Dawson.

Only one of the players who featured against Northamptonshire is in his 30s and that was short-term signing Shannon Gabriel.

Of the others, van Buuren is 29, Gareth Roderick, David Payne and Chris Dent are all 28 while James Bracey, Miles Hammond, George Hankins and Josh Shaw are all still in their early 20s.