England claims the series 2-0 by CricketArchive Staff Reporter

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Ground:	Edgbaston, Birmingham
Scorecard:	England v West Indies
Player:	S Chanderpaul, OA Shah, MJ Prior
Event:	West Indies in England 2009

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DateLine: 26th May 2009

 

England pushed West Indies to another big defeat as they claimed the short ODI series 2-0. On winning the toss the Windies captain had put in England to bat hoping that his pacemen would make the early inroads into the opposition. But the English team batted with caution in the beginning and aggression towards the end to pile up a huge score of 328 in their stipulated 50 overs and then restricted Windies to 270 in 49.4 overs to win the match by 58 runs.

 

Bopara and Strauss began watchfully but after gauging that it was a lifeless surface the duo shifted their gear. Ravi Rampaul struggled with his line but Jerome Taylor was a more threatening. Bopara found the early boundaries while Strauss took time to get his timing going. Fidel Edwards was introduced for the tenth over and nearly removed Strauss with his third ball, but Kieron Pollard spilled a tough chance at point. The first wicket fell when Bopara was undone by the lack of pace in the surface, chopping onto his stumps against Bravo. But after that wicket the West Indian bowlers could not locate the right line and length to the pair of Prior and Strauss. Strauss brought up his half-century with a sweep against Benn, but off the next delivery he faced Strauss was stumped with some very clever piece of thinking by Ramdin.

 

Prior and Shah consolidated briefly, but then opened up and Prior's fifty came off 53. When the batting Powerplay was signalled and Shah immediately opened up and began to express himself. He twice cleared the midwicket boundary with huge blows before being caught on the rope attempting another. Dimitri Mascarenhas' promotion ended with a first-ball duck and Prior missed a heave across the line at Taylor. Paul Collingwood mixed innovation with power to hit 23 off 14 deliveries and a late flurry of wickets, did not stop England from crossing the 300 run mark.

 

Stuart Broad and James Anderson continued their impressive into the third and final match of the series. West Indies needed a big innings from their captain, but after two early boundaries Chris Gayle fell when he spooned an attempted pull to mid-on. After a brief shower, Ramnaresh Sarwan opened his account with consecutive fours but fell soon when he miscued a drive to. Chanderpaul and Morton played cautiously as they tried to prevent a complete collapse. Tim Bresnan helped maintain the pressure created by the opening pair and poor piece of thinking from the part of the batsmen brought another wicket for England. Morton after pushing the ball into the covers raced back for a second only to see Chanderpaul refusing the run and in the end found way short of his crease.

 

Bravo provided some energy to the innings which was almost immobile. He found the boundary ropes twice and also succeeded in clearing the ropes twice. But his innings was short-lived as Bresnan trapped him leg before on the back foot in the next over as West Indies slipped further to another heavy defeat. After Bravo’s dismissal Chanderpaul and Ramdin just kept their wickets intact without looking for much scoring opportunities. The current run-rate remained at around 4 runs per over while the required rate jumped up to nearly 9 and a half even before reaching the 30 over mark. The batting Powerplay was not used till the end of the 36th over and by the time it was taken Chanderpaul got out for a steady 68 as at no stage did it looked like he would win the match. In the very next over Ramdin was gone and then a couple of comical run-outs caused the innings to be terminated by the 50th over.