West Indies part-time spinner Roston Chase the unlikely benefactor as England capitulate

West Indies (289 & 415-6d) beat England (77 & 246) by 381 runs

We should have known that England would not settle for any ordinary old capitulation. Theirs had to have an additional flourish. So, having pulled the rug from under themselves, they proceeded to trip over it repeatedly.*

As expected, the West Indies duly won to put themselves 1-0 up in the series, but perhaps it was inevitable that a team who had virtually condemned themselves to defeat on the second afternoon would not be able to lose without subjecting themselves to one final indignity.

The unlikely benefactor was Roston Chase, a part-time off-spinner with a Test average of 48, who over the course of 20 devious overs took 8-60, figures it is hard to imagine him even threatening to surpass. It was the sixth-best performance by a West Indian in Tests: better than anything Malcolm Marshall, Michael Holding, Joel Garner or Courtney Walsh ever achieved. But then, this is part of the strange and voodoo charm of Joe Root’s England side, a gifted and highly flammable team capable of making anybody in world cricket look masterful, including – occasionally – themselves.

Even here, in the most forlorn of lost causes, there were vague flashes of competence. Rory Burns came tantalisingly close to a maiden Test century. He and Keaton Jennings put on 85 for the opening wicket. At 134-1, you would have backed England to take the game into a face-saving fifth day. But soon they were hunted down – Chased, you might say – as the West Indies recorded their third highest margin of victory in terms of runs. Not bad for a team who had been bowled out for 289 and then reduced to 61-5 in their second innings.

Joe Root shows his frustration after being caught out (Reuters)

But then, perhaps recent history should have portended trouble. England’s recent success has been built not just on their counter-attacking lower-order or their varied bowling attack, but Root’s remarkable record of winning tosses: eight in a row last year. That has often allowed England to play their favoured game: bat first, dictate terms. But it also means that they are particularly vulnerable to scoreboard pressure, and not very much of it either. Remarkably, it’s three years since they won after conceding more than 200 in the first innings of the match. For opposition teams, the equation is fairly simple: bat first, make any sort of score, and watch England garrote themselves.

If it was the West Indies pace bowlers who did the job in the first innings, here it was the gentle darts of Chase, who barely turned a ball off the straight all day, but bowled with accuracy, discipline and some nice changes of pace. It shouldn’t have been enough for a wicket, let alone eight. But from the moment Burns missed a straight one and perished for 84 on the stroke of lunch, England were on an ominous conveyor belt of entirely their own making.

Nobody was able to change the prevailing momentum. Root slashed to slip. Ben Stokes, the only player who had showed a modicum of aggression against the spinner, was LBW propping forward. Moeen, still on 0, played an ugly hew to second slip, thus becoming perhaps the first player ever to record a Test pair with a hook and a late cut. For a player of such lavish talent, an average of 19 in his last 27 innings is little short of self-betrayal.

Roston Chase, left, celebrates the dismissal of Rory Burns (AFP/Getty Images)

Now the West Indies scented a quick kill. Now inspiration was as elementary as breathing. Debutant John Campbell took a stunning full-length catch at short mid-wicket to dismiss Jos Buttler. Adil Rashid swiped the ball to the mid-wicket boundary, where Kraigg Brathwaite took a smart juggling catch. The dismissal of Ben Foakes, meanwhile, was perhaps the most perplexing of the lot: flicking the ball satisfyingly into the leg-side, only for the ball to vanish and emerge a few seconds later in the hands of a disbelieving Shimron Hetmyer.

Sometimes it’s just your week. And the task now for the West Indies is to play twice more with this same intensity, this same hunger, this same skill. For it is now England who are the team with wounded pride, with the motivation to prove to everyone that their rich potential is more than a pleasant mirage. They must start again, chastened and humble, in Antigua next week. Much more than a Test series hangs on their ability to do so.

*with apologies to the late Hugh McIlvanney