Captain makes spinners pay with gritty century

Root’s return to form extends lead to 448 West Indies attack hit by all-rounder Paul’s injury

It was a great day of cricket – for those who believe Test matches should be restricted to four days. Had it been a four-dayer, England would have had to put their skates on instead of steadily accumulate, much of it against modest off-spin, until they took a lead of 448 into day four.

Joe Root took advantage of the circumstances to make his first score of note in this series – which, after 40 runs in the first two Tests, had been on course to be his leanest – and his 16th Test hundred. Those circumstances were as unintense as Test cricket can be, in the third innings of a dead-rubber game when the side with a big first-innings lead build to a declaration. It had to be done – to give Mark Wood and Moeen Ali plenty of runs to play with – but it was routine stuff after the pyrotechnics.

Root, who reached his hundred off 189 balls, was particularly adept at low-risk accumulation against spin. Had he been adept at low-risk accumulation against pace in the first two Test defeats, Root could have led his team to their third consecutive Test series victory.

“It’s really pleasing to make a start count,” Root said. “I’ve been working hard in practice to get behind the ball. My body hasn’t been doing what I wanted but that happens. It felt like it clicked today. It wasn’t pretty at times, it was that kind of wicket and it was obviously a slow outfield. But once I got the rhythm of the game, it started to feel a little bit easier.”

As in most Tests, but this one especially, much harder runs were scored in the first innings. It was the stand of 125 between Jos Buttler and Ben Stokes that finally turned this series England’s way, whereas the partnership of 107 between Root and Buttler consolidated their winning position.

The steam having gone out of it, Buttler made his second 50 of this series – it has been so low-scoring he is alone in having reached that landmark twice – and Joe Denly made his highest Test score of 69. Even Keaton Jennings reached 20.

West Indies, with the Wisden Trophy regained, went through the motions with commendable enthusiasm after their pace attack was reduced by an early quadriceps injury to Keemo Paul. The disco thumped between overs, and some England supporters inflicted Jerusalem more often than the normal once, but after Rory Burns had been dismissed by the first ball of the day, the cricket remained as low-key as a modern Test could be – outside Bulawayo, perhaps.

The loss of their all-rounder resulted in nearly half of the home side’s bowling being done by Roston Chase and Kraigg Brathwaite. Neither of them had prompted a comment by Lance Gibbs when the 84-year-old West Indian off-spinner, who was the world’s leading Test wicket-taker in the 1970s, visited the media centre on day two.

Little, therefore, should be deduced from England’s second innings, after runs had been far harder to acquire in the first, not to mention the first two Tests. Jennings was unfortunate when a ball trickled from his pads on to leg stump, but the one safe deduction is that his Test career has to be shelved until he takes his technique back to the drawing-board and develops a forward defensive stroke which is less like a stab in the dark.

There was much to admire in Denly’s front-foot driving and he scored most of his runs against West Indian pace – only 10 against spin. So, too, in his willingness to bat on the second evening instead of a nightwatchman, once Wood had wreaked his havoc with the fastest spell this correspondent has seen by an England bowler.

Denly’s running between wickets was also excellent, not only for the runs of his partners but extras, too, which have been abundant in this game as the West Indian fast bowlers have tired and lost their hitherto relentless accuracy. And No3, as he has been in St Lucia, looks a much better fit than opening the innings did in Antigua.

Doubts remain, though, about the compactness of Denly’s defence, especially for the first 20 balls. He had been dropped before scoring in Antigua and was dropped here at third slip by Shimron Hetmyer – who would not have been there had Jason Holder been playing – when 12, Denly not dropping his hands in time to avoid Shannon Gabriel’s lifter. Later it was hit-ormiss against Gabriel, a mixture that spanned the spectrum from fine cover drive to fatal firm-footed slash.

Denly’s fortune with dropped catches has not been matched by Burns, who clipped the first ball of day three to square leg. Thus Burns continued the tendency of his sixtest career to find new ways of getting out. The distinction to be made is that Burns has always looked the part, and has usually made a start, and batted well until he has got out, whereas only against spin has Jennings impressed.