Shamar Joseph has taken seven wickets as Australia collapsed at the Gabba to hand West Indies their first Test victory in Australia for 27 years, winning by just eight runs in a breathtakingly dramatic finish.
Chasing 216 to seal a 2-0 series victory, the hosts were cruising at 2-113 in the first session of the fourth day in front of just 3,162 fans in Brisbane on Sunday.
Second-gamer Shamar Joseph (7-68) then broke the Test open, defying a toe crushed by a Mitchell Starc yorker a night earlier to take six wickets in an incredible 10-over spell.
Steve Smith (91 not out) carried his bat in his second Test as an opener and launched an audacious rescue mission. But Joseph was not to be denied, sending Josh Hazlewood’s stumps flying for his seventh wicket and running towards the boundary in incredible scenes as the series was drawn 1-1.
Peaking at around 150km/h, Joseph immediately found life with an old pink ball that had earlier caused Australia’s batters few troubles. He bowled Cameron Green (42) and Travis Head with consecutive balls to begin the collapse.
Head’s golden duck was his third-straight in Tests at the Gabba as he became just the seventh Australian to register a king pair. Smith survived the hat-trick ball but Mitchell Marsh (10) didn’t last much longer, while Alex Carey (two) was Joseph’s fourth victim in a manic six-over spell that also cost 45 runs.
Joseph wasn’t done though, with Starc (21 off 14) becoming his fifth scalp inside seven overs to end a brief cameo from the Australian quick that featured four boundaries.
Australia still needed 45 to win when skipper Pat Cummins, who blazed an unbeaten career-best 64 in the first innings before declaring 22 short of West Indies’ first-innings 311, strode to the crease 10 minutes before the tea break. He was caught behind for just three, Nathan Lyon then surviving until the interval with Australia still requiring 29 to win and complete a 5-0 summer sweep.
Lyon fell in the first over after the resumption, but Smith continued to counter-attack as he spectacularly ramped a six as the target went into single figures. But he exposed Hazlewood once too often and Joseph clattered the stumps once more to cap an incredible solo performance.
Joseph said he thought he’d struggle to even be at the ground after being forced to retire hurt on Saturday night, until chatting to the team doctor. “He did something to my toe, I don’t know what he did,” Joseph said. “I feel that we’ve won the series, even though it’s 1-1. I already cried after my five-wicket haul … I’m not that tired; I told my skipper today I’d bowl today until the last wicket fell.”
Brian Lara hailed him as “a champion”, while fellow West Indies legend Carl Hooper cried tears of emotion in the ABC commentary box. “Shamar Joseph has lit up West Indies cricket. It is a great feeling to be a West Indian,” Lara said afterwards.
“What a champion. Eighteen months ago he was not even on the scene,” Lara enthused on Fox Cricket.
The man from Guyana was limping while moving around the field as the injury to his toe started to take its toll, but he was not daunted. After bowling 10 overs straight before tea, Joseph came back out after the break and delivered the knockout punch by bowling Josh Hazlewood with a superb delivery. (The Guardian)
