Windies and England remain in Barbados for Friday’s second One Day International and after proving more than equal to chasing a high target in the series opener, England are 1-0 up with four to play.
Kensington Oval, Bridgetown was also the venue for this first match of this series and England justified favouritism with a 6 wicket win. The margin of victory was impressive given the visitors were tasked with chasing down Windies bat first total of 360/8, an innings which included 23 maximums, 12 of which came from the bat of Chris Gayle.
Windies won the toss and opted to bat first and although Gayle was cautious in the first power play, he went on to smash his way to 135 off 129 balls. The support came from Shai Hope who made a run a ball 65 and Darren Bravo (40). Ben Stokes with 3/37 in his 8 overs was the pick of the England bowlers. Rashid also took 3 wickets but was expensive and Woakes did reasonably well with figures of 2/59.
It was an excellent batting deck and Jason Roy wasted no time in setting about the chase. Roy went on to score 123 off 85 balls and Joe Root came in at 3 to make 102 to break the back of what was required. Skipper Morgan made 65 and England got home in 48.4 overs. Jason Holder (2/63) was the most successful of the home sides bowling unit and despite completing such a substantial chase, England only cleared the ropes 6 times.
Jason Roy was named Man of the Match.
This was how the teams lined up in the first ODI and Kemar Roach, who missed out on Wednesday through injury, will also be absent for Windies here.
WIndies: Jason Holder (C), Devendra Bishoo, Carlos Brathwaite, Darren Bravo, John Campbell, Chris Gayle, Shimron Hetmyer, Shai Hope, Ashley Nurse, Nicholas Pooran, Oshane Thomas
England: Eoin Morgan(c), Moeen Ali, Jonny Bairstow, Jos Buttler, Liam Plunkett, Adil Rashid, Joe Root, Jason Roy, Ben Stokes, Chris Woakes, Mark Wood
Head to Head
Overall the teams have met 97 times in this format with WIndies winning 42 and England 50 with 5 no results.
In the Caribbean 40 meetings have produced 21 wins for WIndies and 16 for England with 3 no results.
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Verdict:
That was an excellent batting effort from Windies on Wednesday but England got home a touch comfortably and Jason Roy grabbed the MoM award, Joe Roots ton was also vital.
We fancy a 50 is well within Roots compass here.
Bets: Batsman to score a Fifty in the match, Joe Root? (yes) at 18/10 BET HERE
