Dowrich grind and pacers’ burst puts Windies in ascendancy
A fierce opening burst from the Windies pace attack scalped three Sri Lankan wickets and ignited a Test match that had up until that point progressed slowly.
The Windies declared after making 414 from 154 overs, and had Sri Lanka 31/3 at stumps on Thursday, June 7, the second day of the first Test.
The Windies innings, in which only two batsmen were dismissed for less than 38, suggested a pitch where the batsman’s biggest enemy was his own impatience, and in fairness, it was impetuosity that accounted for Kusal Perera, who slashed a Kemar Roach long hop to backward point two deliveries into the reply.
But there was no fault shown in the other two dismissals as Shannon Gabriel got a ball to move away from Kusal Mendis and grab the edge. The quick touched 150 kph in his opening spell, the kind of pace which can take a pitch out of the occasion. Captain Jason Holder claimed the other wicket in his solitary over, swinging the still-new ball away and extracting some bounce with his height to take Angelo Mathews’s edge through to third slip.
Both Holder and Gabriel almost saw their wickets struck off, only for marginal no-ball calls to go their way. It’s been that sort of game for Sri Lanka, who had dismissals overturned for overstepping and countless reviews go against them in the Windies innings, as Dowrich’s epic 125 and a healthy tail wag helped the hosts complete their recovery from 147/5.
Their performances were undoubtedly praiseworthy as they showed sound defensive techniques and deep – in Dowrich’s case endless – reserves of concentration, but on a slow pitch, which after the shine wore off encouraged neither sideways movement or any kind of bounce, both sides were reduced to attrition.
It is the sort of innings that is best described through numbers; if the common cricket fan wasn’t excited, at least the statistician was. Dowrich’s hundred was the first by a West Indian keeper against Sri Lanka, the slowest in terms of balls by a Windies keeper, and, by its conclusion, the longest innings by a Windies keeper too. The 50-over, 102-run stand for the seventh wicket was the team's highest for that partnership at the Queen’s Park Oval.
The climax of the innings saw a slight stir, Roach celebrating taking Windies past 400 with the first six of the innings, clubbing Dilruwan Perera over long-on, before falling soon after as he slapped Lahiru Kumara to cover. But the true excitement was still to come, as a pace performance to evoke Windies memories of old brought to life a game that was in need of it.