Another vindication of Test cricket as Australia scrape home T1 D5

Australia 9/406 dec & 7/192 (47 ov, Watson 52, Deonarine 4/53) beat West Indies 9/449 dec & 148 (66.4 ov, Hilfenhaus 4/27, Harris 3/31) by three wickets to lead series 1-0 with two matches to play: T1 D5 at Bridgetown.


 A cracking day's Test cricket. It  kept me me glued to the box for the West Indies innings and intermittently awake for much of Australia's second innings and wide awake for the last few overs.

West Indies, after wilting on D4, regrouped and kept harrying Australia in all departments, though they couldn't do quite enough to pull off a win. Australia's lower order batting and Michael Clarke's declaration kept the match alive and, while the middle and lower order West Indians made some amends for the disastrous opening they didn't do quite enough against Ben Hilfenhaus 17-7-27-4 and Ryan Harris 8.4-2-31-3 to set Australia a really challenging target. Or so it seemed at the time.

Even so the visitors struggled against a mixed bag of an attack: Fidel Edwards, Kemar Roach and Darren Sammy bowled well, and often sharply, while  Narsingh Deonarine's 11-1-53-4 reflected both a fifth day wicket assisting spin and the occasional lapses of a part time bowler;  Devendra Bishoo was expensive. (To be fair to Deonarine he did dismiss both Ricky Ponting for 14 and Michael Clarke for 6, something which not too many, if any, other bowlers would have done in such quick succession).

Shane Watson 52/57b (1x6,4x4), Ed Cowan a by many accounts (I dozed off during his dig) scratchy 34/100b (1x4) and Mike Hussey 32/26b (2x6, 2x4) took Australia slowly forward before Harris and Hilfenhaus nervously took Australia in fading light over the line to a deserved and hard fought victory. Yet the West Indies showed that they, even without Chris Gayle and Darren Bravo,  are no easybeats, and the rest of the series will be worth watching (if not live through the wee small hours then and the extended highlights).




Scorecard

Fox Sports report with link to video highlights

Australian players rated by Fox Sports

Close shave for Ponting, though not for Australia: T4 D3

Australia 445 defeated England 102 and 263 (61.3 ov, G Swann 62, S Broad 61, M Johnson 5/69, B Hilfenhaus 4/60) by an innings and 80 runs: Ashes 09 T4 D3 at Headingley, Leeds.

When Ricky Ponting led Australia onto the field at the start of play his clean shaven face (the first time I can recall seeing it thus so early in on a match day) indicated that he wanted, and probably expected the match, to be wrapped up quickly.

Well, some beer match hitting by Graeme Swann and Stuart Broad didn't postpone the inevitable for too long, even if it did show what might, just might, have been achieved had those higher in the order shown more application.

Mitchell Johnson accelerated his series improvement and Ben Hilfenhaus maintained his Ashes form, yet Stuart Clark and, to a lesser degree Peter Siddle, disappointed with the ball, and some of the Aust fielding was pretty lethargic too,

D3's biffing, which at least did give the crowd something for their overpriced ticket money, (and let the skinflint Yorkshire authorities off the hook of giving a refund) was fundamentally a coda to a monumental form reversal by each side.

Of course this isn't the first time this has happened in this series: remember Cardiff and Lord's?

Will it , can it, might it happen again? No comment....just now.



Scorecard