Shai Hope’s century leads West Indies to victory over England in 1st ODI | Cricket

After crashing at the World Cup the England white-ball side, like a malfunctioning laptop, has been turned off and on again, rebooted and updated but, when it came to restarting, had another malfunction.

After posting a record score on this ground they failed to defend it, losing against West Indies by four wickets, and while the batting of England’s captain, Jos Buttler, continues to suggest major programming errors it was his opposite number, Shai Hope, who steered his team to victory.

Hope, who like Buttler combines wicketkeeping duties with captaincy, eased past the mark of 5,000 one‑day international runs on his way to a superb century, stabilising his side through the middle overs before accelerating to the target of 326.

He eventually sealed the win by blasting three sixes off four Sam Curran deliveries, victory achieved with seven balls to spare.

But for all his calm and quality West Indies seemed to be drifting towards defeat until the arrival at the crease of Romario Shepherd shifted the game in their favour. The all‑rounder had England’s heads spinning as he scored 48 off 28, with Curran and Brydon Carse both losing control under the pressure he exerted. Curran in particular took terrible punishment, and his last three overs went for 19, 15 and 19 again – the last with a ball unbowled.

So much for the new dawn. It had fallen to Phil Salt and Will Jacks, two players deemed insufficiently important to merit central contracts but promised the opening berths for the duration of this series, to launch England’s intended rebirth, and they threw themselves at the challenge with promising style and aggression.

It was their third opening partnership, and all three sit in the top 10 – out of 33 in total – of England’s best of the past two years. Salt in particular tore into Oshane Thomas and Alzarri Joseph, West Indies’ opening bowlers as after winning the toss – Buttler’s eighth such success on the spin – England scored 76 without loss in the first eight overs. But then they started losing wickets and with them momentum: Salt, after scoring 45 off 28, guided a delivery from the left-arm spinner Gudakesh Motie to cover and an over later Jacks followed, nicking behind.

Ben Duckett was bowled by Yannic Cariah for 20 soon afterwards after missing an attempt to paddle the ball down the leg side. In their second eight overs England scored 34 at 4.25 an over, losing three wickets along the way.

Zak Crawley and Harry Brook stabilised the innings, the former benefiting from Motie’s terrible if sun‑blinded drop at long on to reach 48 before being very emphatically run out to bring Buttler to the crease.

Since the first ODI against New Zealand at Sophia Gardens in September, when Buttler’s 72 was his fourth score above 50 in six innings in the format, he has not repeated the feat in 13 attempts. In his past eight innings he has now scored 78 runs at an average of 9.75 and a strike rate of 75.72.

Here he scored three off 13, taking a few easy singles before attempting a reverse sweep off Motie and gloving the ball to Alick Athanaze at slip, who juggled it into the air before taking it at the second attempt. By the time the ball finally dropped into his hands Buttler had tucked his bat under his arm and started his trudge to the dressing room. His was the only outright failure on England’s scorecard, Brook top‑scoring with 71 off 72 and Curran and Carse, in particular, scoring late runs in England’s innings that ended up being not quite as important as those they leaked towards the end of West Indies’ chase.

A total of 325 felt like enough, particularly on a pitch that assisted the spinners while also offering variable bounce – as demonstrated by Liam Livingstone, irredeemably lbw to a delivery from the 6ft 3in Shepherd that barely left the turf at all. But Brandon King and the excellent Athanaze attacked their side’s challenge with no suggestion of concern.

Athanaze, at 24 one of a fresh generation being perhaps belatedly ushered into the West Indies team, hit nine fours and two sixes, one of them a pull of vicious perfection that sent the ball soaring into the car park, on his way to 66 off 65 but, as with England if slightly later, the openers fell in successive overs and following their departures, and the arrival of Rehan Ahmed and Liam Livingstone’s spin that precipitated them, the scoring slowed and the required run rate climbed.

At the time Shimron Hetmyer’s dismissal, having scored 32 off 30 and with 126 still needed, felt potentially crucial but Sherfane Rutherford showed his side’s spirit by crashing his first delivery in ODI cricket down the ground for six, and when he swiftly fell Shepherd simply set off, still more successfully, on the same, irresistible course.