Categories: Cricket

ENG v WI 2024, ENG vs WI 1st Test Match Report, July 10 – 14, 2024

West Indies 79 for 6 (Athanaze 22, Anderson 2-11, Stokes 2-25) and 121 trail England 371 (Crawley 76, Smith 70, Root 68, Seales 4-77) by 171 runs

England need four more wickets to secure an innings win over West Indies inside three days, after James Anderson, Gus Atkinson and Ben Stokes shared six wickets on the second evening. The hosts were dominant with the bat, scoring at more than four runs per over across their first innings and then turned the screw with the ball to close in on a 1-0 lead.

Needing to score 250 – more than double their first-innings total – just to make England bat again, West Indies slumped to 37 for 4 inside 19 overs. Anderson’s inswinger knocked back Kraigg Brathwaite’s middle stump, Stokes removed Mikyle Louis and Kirk McKenzie during a ten-over spell, and Kavem Hodge chopped Atkinson onto his own stumps.

West Indies’ batters were far too passive, looking to survive rather than score but ultimately managing neither. Alick Athanaze was a rare exception from No. 4, but he fell for 22 to a textbook Anderson set-up: he was worked over from around the wicket, with some balls shaping in and others leaving him before edging behind as he attempted to push through the covers.

Joshua da Silva and Jason Holder added 24 for the sixth wicket – damningly, West Indies’ third-highest stand of the match – but England struck with the final ball of the day. Stokes laid a short-ball trap with two men out on the hook, and Holder could only fend Atkinson’s bumper to Ollie Pope at short leg.

England were bowled out at the tea interval on the second afternoon, compiling a substantial first-innings lead with Harry Brook, Joe Root and debutant Jamie Smith joining Zak Crawley and Pope in scoring half-centuries. Other than Jayden Seales, the pick of the attack, West Indies’ bowlers were short on red-ball match practice – and it showed.

Root and Brook scored heavily square of the wicket in the first hour, with Brook batting fluently in his first Test innings in almost a year. In his 13th Test, he reached fifty for the 12th time but failed to add to it: he top-edged an attempted hook off Alzarri Joseph straight to da Silva, reinforcing the belief that he can be susceptible against the short ball.

During his innings of 68, Root went past Allan Border’s career aggregate to enter the top ten of all-time Test run-scorers but he fell shortly before lunch. He was the second England batter, after Stokes, to fall victim to an exceptional Gudakesh Motie delivery, raising the question as to why it took Brathwaite so long to bring his left-arm spinner into the attack.

Stokes’ first international innings of the season lasted only 11 balls. Motie, who vindicated his selection ahead of Kevin Sinclair, tossed the ball up in his first over of the morning and found sharp turn after landing it on a footmark. It ripped back past the inside edge of Stokes’ swish and left him open-mouthed as it knocked his middle stump out of the ground.

In the penultimate over before the interval, Root was left smiling in disbelief after losing his off stump. This time, Motie went wide on the crease and bowled his arm ball with an upright seam. Root shaped to punch into the off side as the delivery drifted in sharply, but it deviated late off the pitch to beat him on the outside edge.

Smith was the protagonist of the second session, hitting Seales over the Tavern Stand and onto St John’s Wood Road during his maiden Test innings. He shared a sedate partnership of 52 with Chris Woakes but after Woakes and Atkinson fell in quick succession to the second new ball, Smith found a new gear while batting with the tail, even with the field spread.

After starting his innings uncharacteristically slowly, he started to skip down the pitch and crunched Shamar Joseph into the Grandstand for six, three overs after reaching a 98-ball half-century. Three overs later, he gave himself room and cracked Seales’ short ball over midwicket and out of Lord’s altogether.

Louis’ dead-eye, direct-hit run-out of Shoaib Bashir at the non-striker’s end meant the retiring Anderson was applauded out to the middle for what may well prove to be his final innings in Test cricket. But he didn’t face a ball, with Smith pulling the final delivery of Seales’ over to McKenzie at deep backward square leg to finish with 70.

Shamar Joseph spent some of the afternoon session off the field due to some muscle tightness after a recent diet of T20, and was seen receiving treatment on his left hamstring in the dressing room. He was forced to leave the field midway through his 15th over, and looked in discomfort after getting through one further over with the second new ball.

There are not enough batters left for Anderson to leapfrog the late Shane Warne and become the second-highest wicket-taker in the format’s history. But in his 188th and final Test, he has the opportunity to clinch one final victory for his country on Friday.

Matt Roller is an assistant editor at ESPNcricinfo. @mroller98