There couldn’t be worse methods to launch a title defence. The West Indies, world champions, T20 ninjas, crash-landed to 55 all out in 14.2 overs, towards the staff that they had toppled to the title, 5 years in the past on the Eden Gardens. If ever England went into the sport with revenge on their thoughts, it may need resulted in buying and selling empathetic glances at their devastated opponents.
Memories of that electrical evening in Kolkata appeared distant, maybe as distant because the advantage of logic and West Indies batsmen. It’s fathomable if high-class bowling precipitates a meltdown, the torture of physique and soul West Indies quick bowlers of the yore repeatedly subjected English batsmen to. But this was merely a case of what can, at greatest, be known as a mockery of a batting present, a case of contagious and collective brainfreeze. A guide on how to not bat, in any format, at any stage.
Evin Lewis mistimed his chip of Chris Woakes and was pouched adeptly by a springing Moeen Ali; Lendl Simmons struck the ball sweetly however straight into Liam Linvingston at deep midwicket. West Indies stumbled to 2/9 in 2.2 overs.
The state of affairs known as for knuckling and seeing by means of the storm. For a number of overs, Chris Gayle and Shimron Hetmyer did train warning. But not for lengthy. After thumping Ali for 2 beautiful boundaries and dead-batting the third, conveying false notions that essentially the most dazzling of West Indies recent crop batsmen, Hetmyer dragged a flat, quick in need of size ball straight to mid-wicket. So aghast was he that he showered himself with a volley of abuse.
Eight balls later, Tymal Mills rushed Gayle right into a pull, the one occasion whereby a genuinely good ball, although not a non-negotiable supply, winked out a wicket. More typically than not, Gayle would have deposited the ball within the stands, however right here, he underestimated Mill’s steep bounce and tempo. He would have escaped undamaged however for the athleticism and consciousness of a back-pedalling Dawid Malan at midwicket.
Thereafter, it was only a matter of protecting the West Indies batsmen quiet. Ali was exemplary at that, rattling in 18 dot balls. Dwayne Bravo, unusually pushed up the order, lower a Chris Jordan ball straight to the fielder at backward level. Nicholas Pooran had a wishy-washy swipe exterior the off-stump, his toes static, and edged to the keeper.
In strode out Andre Russell, one of many heroes of the 2016 triumph, his staff at 44/6. Then the primary ball he confronted, he tried to smack it out of the bottom. A hideous leg-side heave to a left-arm seamer bowling from over the stumps and slanting the ball throughout. He was overwhelmed neck and crop. This injudicious method embodied the mess. He is bowled the following ball, by an Adil Rashid slider that slithered by means of his uncovered gate. The England leggie picked up three extra scalps to finish his finish with scarcely plausible determine of 4/2 together with the wicket of Kieron Pollard, the final flickering hope of the champions. Often it was an unlucky case of two for the value of 1 for Rashid. But, alas, the match can be remembered extra for West Indies’s comical meltdown than Rashid’s twinkling variations.
The evening ended extra ruefully for them, as England stuttered of their chase, had been 39/4 at one stage, however the goal was too low to make a critical contest out of it.
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