Five-star Wood hits Windies
MARK WOOD cut a surgical swathe through the West Indies batting lineup with old-fashioned pace, pace and more pace.
Wood, below, claimed his first Test five-wicket haul and he did it with one of the fastest spells of bowling by an Englishman, hitting 94.6mph.
That gave the home batsmen a taste of their own medicine as they were dismissed for 154 in reply to England’s 277.
Wood said: “It’s a day I’ll never forget.”
By taking 5-41 in 8.2 overs of aggressive and hostile bowling, Wood did plenty to remind fans of fellow Ashington pace hero Steve Harmison, who destroyed the Windies in 2004.
Harmison looked on in delight as Wood picked up wicket after wicket either side of tea, before returning to complete the job with an hour of day two to play.
Openers Keaton Jennings and Rory Burns then survived to take England to the close on 19-0, a lead of 142.
ASHINGTON lad Mark Wood took up the baton passed on from Steve Harmison to put the frighteners up the West Indies batsmen with a searing spell of pace.
It showed just what England had been missing as the Windies were routed for 154 yesterday.
It has been a long time coming for Wood who has battled with injuries since playing his part in the 2015 Ashes win, but he has always been the bowler that England hoped could provide the pace X factor.
Wood claimed his best-ever Test figures of 5-41 thanks to a passage of play that had every eyeball in the ground trained on the middle.
“It feels fantastic,” he said afterwards. “All the hard times I’ve had with injury, and the selfdoubt, today I felt like an England player.
“I spoke to Broady and Jimmy about how they deal with selfdoubt and belief so I’m pleased today has been a good day. I have to back it up now.
“I have had some bad times. I had no confidence putting my foot down in delivery – our bowling coach likened it to a batsman closing one eye and trying to bat. There were times where I was desperate to do well but it wasn’t quite happening for me.”
Before this game Wood had spoken about wanting to follow in the footsteps of Calypso King Harmison who ripped through the Windies back in 2004, and when Shimron Hetmyer was caught at slip for his fourth scalp, here was another Durham dynamo doing just that.
“Having a quick bowler, especially away from home, is so important,” said Harmison, now a Talksport pundit. “Everybody can get behind a real pace bowler and it changes the whole atmosphere.”
Just as Shannon Gabriel had done at the start of the day when he roughed up England’s remaining batsmen and started the collapse from 232-4 to 277 all out, Wood turned on the afterburners to great effect.
It took him just five balls to claim his first wicket of the series, but the previous four had given a good indication of how he would be going about his work.
Shai Hope looked rattled as the ball fizzed past him. The only ball he managed to get some bat on was the fifth and he drove loosely to Rory Burns in the gully. The next delivery was too quick for Roston Chase as he fended another catch to Burns that flew even faster to send England into giddy delight.
Moeen Ali had already taken the first two wickets in two balls and he was to take two more to finish with 4-36 thanks to a smart Jonny Bairstow stumping and a stunning one-handed catch by Stuart Broad at mid-off.
But this innings really was all about one man who has had his fair share of disappointments but who was asked to come back on by skipper Joe Root with one wicket left to take – and by uprooting Gabriel’s middle stump he claimed his first-ever Test five-for.
In keeping with the chaotic and somewhat dubious selection policy for this tour Wood wasn’t even supposed to be here, with Warwickshire’s Olly Stone picked ahead of him only to return home with a stress fracture in his lower back.
However, as Wood knows only too well, someone’s injury hell is another person’s good fortune.
Harmison added: “This has brought a big smile to my face – I’ve seen him grow up and seen how hard he works to get himself fit again and again and again.
“I was talking to Mark before he got selected. We had been coaching the kids at Ashington Leisure Centre when we heard that Olly Stone was coming home. I said ‘it has to be you, it can only be you.’”