West Indies v Australia: fifth T20 international – live!

What do you call a medium pacer with a golden arm? Jacob Aurum? Marsh does it again. Not before Simmons comes to the six party, slogging a low full toss over long on. But Marsh changes to around the wicket against the right-hander, angling it sharply across as a right-armer. It’s a friendly length for Simmons to go over extra cover, but he doesn’t, already stepping across his stumps. Off balance, he tries to hoick over the leg side. A sacrifice play, almost, with Andre Russell due in next. Just has to have a go at everything. But this is the wrong go, and Simmons gives up a loopy catch to point.

13th over: West Indies 162-3 (Simmons 15, Pooran 24) Hazlewood returns with two overs up his sleeve. Bowls this one well, aside from overstepping the crease at one point. But he saves the free hit by conceding a single. Simmons slices a lucky boundary through deep third, then Pooran steps across and misses a flick that misses his leg stump by a centimetre.

Another instance of good umpiring in this series: some umpires would have incorrectly called that a wide for going outside the line of the batter’s pads, but Pooran had moved across from his original stance point, so it’s not a wide.

12th over: West Indies 152-3 (Simmons 7, Pooran 23) Swepson nearly has Simmons stumped first ball of the over, but the right-hander throws his pad outside leg stump in a very yogic fashion and manages to get some pad on the ball. Deflects it just wider of Wade and away for an extra. That brings Pooran on strike, and he’s not here to hang around.

Six, six, six, four, with a wide in between. Two straight hits down the ground, very simple strikes.

Two shots pulled over the leg side, not exactly short but Pooran making the most of their length by getting back quickly.

This is dizzying. 15 sixes in 12 overs.

11th over: West Indies 127-3 (Simmons 7, Pooran 1) Two runs and a leg bye from Zampa’s over as Australia’s players draw breath.

10th over: West Indies 124-3 (Simmons 6) What an innings from Lewis though, 79 from 34 balls. The sub fielder is Hurricanes player Nathan Ellis, who isn’t formally in the squad but is helping out.

Mitch Marsh is the new Golden Bollocks! A late entree to the bowling attack for him, he has been very good with his medium pace this series. We have seen that batting gets harder as an innings wears on. Taking some pace off the ball as it gets softer and digging it into the surface can work. Marsh does so, using a hard length to force both batsmen to hit singles to his off-side sweepers. Sixth ball of the over, he bounces Lewis, and is unimpressed when the umpire calls it a wide. But he’s grateful a moment later when he bowls the seventh ball. Lewis can’t stand an over without a six, and tries to flat-bat it straight. Doesn’t get hold of it, that lack of pace, and hits it high to cover where there’s a fielder on the circle.

9th over: West Indies 119-2 (Lewis 77, Simmons 4) Zampa to bowl to Lewis, just after Lewis has taken down the other leggie, and Australia just have to hope that he makes a mistake. On track for a huuuuge score here otherwise. Zampa does well, using the Swepson-Gayle trick of angling hard across the left-hander, only letting him cut a single. Simmons facing four balls of the over is a good way to limit the damage from Lewis. Two singles apiece. An over conceding four runs is a triumph in the circumstances.

8th over: West Indies 115-2 (Lewis 75, Simmons 2) Seven sixes out of 63 runs for Lewis, that has to be close to a record for the proportion. He adds number eight and nine in this over! Simmons takes three balls to hand over strike against Swepson, then Lewis immediately belts a full ball over long on, then skips back to pull a shorter one over midwicket. Into the boundary rope on the full. That makes 54 of his 75 runs in sixes.

7th over: West Indies 102-2 (Lewis 63, Simmons 1) Gee, Evin Lewis will not be denied. AJ Tye starts really well: the knuckle ball, some angle across, three dot balls and a sliced boundary behind point with some luck to it. But the last two balls of the over Lewis just bangs over the fence. A toe-ended slog is the quintessential T20 era shot, because it still makes the journey over long off, far from where it was directed. The length ball over long on goes exactly where intended.

6th over: West Indies 84-2 (Lewis 47, Simmons 0) Simmons and Lewis are reunited, the opening partnership from the previous match, as Swepson gets through his over for only three runs.

A very, very brave move from Aaron Finch. Gayle has monstered Zampa in two matches now, and Finch brings on his other leg-spinner. Poses a challenge. Swepson is up to it, first bowling a yorker length that Gayle only drives for one. Then when he has the big left-hander back on strike, Swepson angles the ball across him very wide. It’s the googly, turning away, and it pitches on a good enough length that it has time to turn. Gayle tries to fetch it to the leg side, and the combination of factors mentioned above mean that he can’t get purchase. Sends it high up into the sky instead, and thank goodness for Behrendorff that he has the composure to hold onto the catch at mid off.

5th over: West Indies 81-1 (Lewis 46, Gayle 20) Lewis picks up where Gayle left off. Steps forward to Behrendorff first ball and drives him classically through cover for four. Behrendorff can’t handle the heat tonight, he’s sweating profusely, and perhaps can’t grip the ball properly, because he lets go of another full toss and Lewis belts this one over midwicket for six as well. A long conference with Finch, and the discussion probably doesn’t involve bowling a half-volley for Lewis to lift over long-off for six, but that’s what Finch gets. Behrendorff gets a couple of dot balls through, but finishes the over with another full toss, smacked back past him for four.

Wild. That over costs 21. He’s gone for 46 off 3.

4th over: West Indies 60-1 (Lewis 26, Gayle 20) Chris Gayle to the wicket then, and while he normally starts slowly, he gets forward to drive Zampa through covers first ball for four. Zampa bowls a little straighter, giving Gayle enough length to get under, so Gayle does, over midwicket for six! Just a bend of the knee and a swing through. He respects the next ball, defending, but then sees Zampa move the line across outside off stump. It’s hardly short, but Gayle gets his bat low and digs through a cut shot, bouncing it past backward point for four. Then sees the line moved back across to his pads and drop-kicks it over long on.

What a turnaround! A wicket from the first ball, then 20 runs from five balls for Chris Gayle. Zampa just shakes his head and laughs. Whaddyagonnado?

Bowled! First ball of Zampa’s night, in the Powerplay, and the leg-spinner has done it. Couldn’t take a wicket in the first three matches, came good with a rush in the fourth – he was the one who upset the West Indies chase. And he strikes again here. The yorker from a leg-spinner, and why not? He loops the ball towards the stumps, which has the effect of making Fletcher freeze in the headlights. Will it be a full toss? Should he come forward? He doesn’t know, and it curves down to land by his toes, rooted to the pitch as he finally plays an ineffectual swish and the ball hits middle stump.

4th over: West Indies 40-0 (Fletcher 12, Lewis 26) Fletcher decides to chance his arm, charging Hazlewood to play T-ball off a length, and gets it straight for six. He’s in the game. Hazlewood is in the game too. Shortens his length to defeat another attempted charge, then fires in the yorker that is pretty close to hitting Fletcher in front, squeezed out for a single.

3rd over: West Indies 31-0 (Fletcher 4, Lewis 25) Fletcher is battling, 4 from 12 balls, and the luck isn’t with him: when Behrendorff bowls a no-ball, that’s the time when Fletcher manages to get a single. So he doesn’t get to face the free hit. As often happens, Lewis misses the free hit entirely, swinging himself off his feet as it nearly hits the stumps. But Behrendorff makes the compounded error: he oversteps again. And bowls a full toss. Lewis doesn’t miss out this time, six over wide long on. The ball takes a long time to come back. Behrendorff nearly recovers his over with the next ball, drawing a leading edge from Lewis that just clears the bowler while falling short of mid on. But then bowls miles outside leg stump for the last ball, Lewis chasing it with a sweep shot to pick it up over long leg for six.

A very poor over from Behrendorff, costing 16. You can bowl a decent over in T20s that still goes for 16, such are the vagaries of the format. But this one was all about a bowler’s errors.

2nd over: West Indies 15-0 (Fletcher 3, Lewis 12) Hazlewood is the other new-ball operator, and Lewis is still making the running. It takes Fletcher four balls to get off strike, a mixture of bowling outside the off stump with others angling in. It takes Lewis one ball to clout a pull shot over midwicket for four.

1st over: West Indies 9-0 (Fletcher 2, Lewis 7) Starc may be out, but Australia have another tall left-armer to swing the ball into the right-hander. Fletcher is duly circumspect, taking a couple of singles. Not so the left-hander though. Lewis gets a ball on his pads, friendly length, and deposits it over deep square leg for six.

West Indies
Andre Fletcher
Evin Lewis
Chris Gayle
Lendl Simmons
Darren Bravo
Nicholas Pooran * +
Andre Russell
Fabian Allen
Hayden Walsh
Sheldon Cottrell
Oshane Thomas

Left-arm spinner Akira Hosein is back out of the side after one match, Dwayne Bravo returns. Lendl Simmons drops down from opening despite his brilliant work the other night. Perhaps Lewis and Fletcher are more in need of the gallop. Changes ahoy for Australia though, giving almost everyone in the squad a run with the series coming to an end.

Australia
Aaron Finch *
Josh Philippe
Mitchell Marsh
Moises Henriques
Alex Carey
Matthew Wade +
Andrew Tye
Jason Behrendorff
Adam Zampa
Mitchell Swepson
Josh Hazlewood

Hazlewood, Swepson and Tye make up almost a new bowling attack, replacing Mitch Starc, Meredith, and Christian. That’s a much weakened batting line-up with Tye coming in too high at No7. Can club, but not with those shoes. The other change is Philippe coming back in, and he gets his preferred job as opener, pushing Wade down the order to provide some of the late-innings grunt that has departed with Christian.

The only squad players who haven’t been involved in the past two matches are the Agar brothers. Ashton played earlier n the series and is a regular part of best XI calculations. Wes is yet to debut in any format. He’ll have to keep waiting. Might feel hard done by – if ever he were to have a chance, Game 5 of a decided series with a raft of big names not in the squad was a good one.

Finally, the coin does not fall Aaron Finch’s way. Nicholas Pooran, deputising for the injured Kieron Pollard, gets to decide how the match will run today. He does indeed choose to bat first.