Daily Mirror (Northern Ireland)
MASTER BLASTER MO WINS BATTLE OF THE SIXES
Amazing Ali batters sad Windies with SEVEN fours and EIGHT sixes in his match-winning ton
MAGNIFICENT Moeen Ali won the battle of the sixes to fire England to victory.
Moeen lit up a gloomy Bristol with an afternoon of sixy cricket which saw him go the distance by clobbering EIGHT maximums in a 14-ball spell to bring up his third one-day ton and move from 50 to 100 in just 12 balls – the fastest in history.
And arriving in just 53 balls, it was the second quickest oneday hundred by an England player following Jos Buttler’s 46-ball effort in Dubai against Pakistan in 2015.
The win means another ODI win and an unassailable 2-0 series lead over West Indies.
Moeen might not be as powerfully built as Ben Stokes or Buttler, but what he lacks in muscle he more than makes up for in timing – peppering the boundary at will yesterday.
Bristol is a smaller ground than most, but Moeen’s bat arcs in a similar way to Jim Furyk’s golf swing, and connected with such force that many of his blows would have made, or cleared, the ropes anywhere.
He said: “It was a good time to come into bat and I had licence to try and clear the ropes. As soon as I hit one, it felt good. I’ve not struck the ball that well for a long time.
“I was trying to play as many shots as I could.
“I think they bowled a lot in the slot for me and it was one of those days when things went my way. I had a bit of a slog really and it came off.”
The shellshocked Windies were crushed by 124 runs, despite striking 13 sixes of their own as part of a record 28 for a match in England.
Chris Gayle, inevitably, led the way with six maximums in his 94 which kept the tourists in the hunt for a spell. He even took Moeen downtown for three sixes in an over too.
But once Gayle was run out yet again this summer – taking on Adil Rashid at mid-wicket and losing – the chase fell away never to recover.
If Moeen stole the show with his blitz that fired 217-6 into 369-9, there should still be room for high praise for Joe Root’s 84 and Stokes’ 73 which stabilised the innings after an encouraging start for the Windies.
Praise too for Chris Woakes, who was the perfect foil for Moeen in their partnership of 117 of which he contributed just 34.
And in the bowling department Liam Plunkett’s career-best
5-52 helped wrap up the contest with more than 10 overs to spare as the gap between the sides grows ever wider.