It was probably apt that the weather should have the final say on a shivery September series that has seemed to be dodging around the arrival of autumn all the way from Chester-le-Street to London. A thrilling, run-filled day at The Oval began in low white cloud and ended in steady rain as England sealed the one-day international series against West Indies with one match still to play, snatching the game by six runs on DLS.
West Indies will feel aggrieved, having seemed to be ahead in the game from the opening 10 overs. A feisty, canny partnership of 77 in eight overs between Jos Buttler and Moeen Ali first rescued England’s innings then spurred them over the line in the final over before the skies closed in, heavy rain drawing the billowing plastic sheets across the outfield.
There will be consolation for the visitors in the way they performed here. Not to mention further evidence that for all its fissures West Indies cricket continues to produce hugely talented young players.
With the series there to be won England had opted to bowl first at lunchtime under a close ceiling of smoggy autumn mist. At which point the Trinidadian Evin Lewis lit up the afternoon with a sensational innings of 176 from 130 balls. Opening the innings, the lithe, oddly effortless Lewis carved and pulled and lofted England’s bowlers to every corner in a remarkable show of pure, clean hitting. He eventually retiring hurt after smashing the ball on to his foot with Viv Richards’s West Indies record of 189 in his sights.
Lewis’s efforts were all the more worthy having emerged from a point of crisis, with West Indies reduced to 33 for three in the seventh over. Scientists have assured us that cloud and humidity have little to do with whether a cricket ball swings. Empirical evidence keeps on suggesting otherwise. Here Chris Woakes produced a fine, nibbly opening spell, the centrepiece of which was a wonderfully subtle working over of Chris Gayle. First Woakes bowled a snaking in-swinger, cooing theatrically as it passed off stump, before following up with an away-swinger to draw a concrete-booted prod to first slip. The Universe boss wandered off for what might be the last time at this ground, a player who wears his Bossdom heavily these days and must surely fear formal impeachment proceedings before long.
Lewis kept on going, finding a partner in the clean-hitting Jason Holder, with whom he added 168 in 18 overs to drive West Indies on to 356 for five. England’s bowlers failed to build on Woakes’s early control. Moeen was treated like a second spinner. Liam Plunkett, unlucky to miss out on Ashes selection, did not have his best day.
In reply England started gamely. Jason Roy replaced Alex Hales at the top of the order and played with flighty freedom, skittering along to 84. After which it was the turn of the 20-year-old Antiguan Alzarri Joseph to cut England’s innings in half, taking the first five wickets in a fine spell of urgent, unsmiling menace. Roy nicked behind, as did Jonny Bairstow and Joe Root. Eoin Morgan came into this game with 22 runs in his previous nine innings and almost doubled that before holing out hooking. Joseph’s fifth wicket even brought the agreeable sight of the otherwise static Gayle taking a fine tumbling slip catch, rolling himself slowly down on to the turf like a heat-struck beefeater fainting on guard duty.
The game looked to be almost done at that point, but England bat murderously deep these days. The Buttler-Moeen partnership was a smart, well-judged rescue act, the rain a cruel intervention for West Indies.
