Cricket: West Indies’ historic comeback
In all the decades I’ve spent “watching, playing and commentating on Test cricket”, said Mike Atherton in The Times, “I cannot think of a bigger upset.” West Indies came into the second Test against England still reeling from their humiliating three-day defeat at Edgbaston. But in a stunning turnaround, the tourists successfully chased down a fourth-innings target of 322 to win the game and level the series ahead of the final Test at Lord’s next week. The undisputed stars of the show were Barbadian batsmen Kraigg Brathwaite and Shai Hope, “following up their hundreds in the first innings with magnificent contributions in the second”. Brathwaite hit a superb 95, before Hope calmly guided West Indies home with an unbeaten 118 – becoming “the first man to score two hundreds in a first-class game at Headingley”. It was an astonishing result: the 20th highest successful run chase in Test history and third highest in England.
Hope “started this match a kid but finished it a man”, said Andy Bull in The Guardian. The 23-year-old batsman previously had an average of just 18, with only a single 50 in his 11 Tests. But he has impressed coaches with his eagerness to improve, and his batting at Headingley was “imperious, almost impeccable”. Having achieved something that no one else has managed at Yorkshire’s hallowed ground – “not Len Hutton, not Herbert Sutcliffe, not Geoff Boycott” – Hope looks set to “become a very familiar sight in the next decade”.
Joe Root has been criticised for declaring at the end of day four with two wickets remaining, said Nasser Hussain in the Daily Mail. “Previous captains would probably have batted on” to minimise the chances of defeat. But “everyone expected the pitch to deteriorate”, and England’s bowlers weren’t their usual selves. The fielding wasn’t stellar either, said Jack Skelton on BBC Sport online. Alastair Cook dropped Brathwaite when he was on four, and Hope on 106. But this is no time for a post-mortem; instead, we should all be celebrating West Indies’ first victory in England in 17 years. This win alone won’t solve the problems blighting Caribbean cricket, but it showed that this team can still compete at the top. “Roll on Lord’s.”