Jonny Bairstow's career-best performance and a sparkling 96 from Jason Roy helped England hammer Windies in the final One-Day International by nine wickets to round off the series and the home season in convincing fashion last week. Bairstow once again stamped his authority on the opposition to ensure that Roy's antics at the other end prove to be no threat whatsoever to his hard-earned spot as he remained unbeaten on 141 off just 114 deliveries while chasing 289.
The willpower of Bairstow was on display during the chase as he played second foil at the start when Roy was rampaging through with boundaries in the powerplay. Roy himself was a man on a mission after losing out his spot to Bairstow and for the second game in the running, he made the most of the opportunity presented to him by Alex Hales's absence. Roy ferociously cut and pull through the course of his innings as his strike rate continued to be on the ascendency with the Windies's strategy to keep bowling short to him proving to be futile.
Roy, who moved into the nineties in quick time, tried to nudge one straight down the ground and missed the ball completely to become the first and eventually, the only victim on the night. Despite falling short of a ton by four runs, the 180 runs he made over the last two games is certain to keep Hales and Bairstow on their toes. With more than half the runs wiped out by the time Joe Root joined Bairstow out in the middle, it was only a formality for the hosts to bat sensibly and close out the chase.
They did exactly that as the middle overs were milked for singles and twos. The approach towards pinching those quick runs was stark in contrast between the two sides. While the Windies were happy to be strolling around for those singles, England's top three were always looking to be active in order to fetch those extra runs.
England would have been chasing much lesser though had the Windies not finished off their innings in style. Chris Gayle imposed himself on Jake Ball at the start of the innings after his side was sent into bat, but after smashing 40 off 28 balls, he failed to read debutant Tom Curran's slower delivery and walked back to an applause from the English crowd, who realised that the cameo could have been his final outing in the country in Windies colours.
The visitors continued to build on from the momentum before Liam Plunkett's reflexes came to the fore yet again as Kyle Hope hit one back at the bowler that was pouched one-handed low to his left. Following the departure of the openers, Windies' run rate started to dip slowly as Marlon Samuels found the going tough yet again. Having not gone past 20 even once on the tour prior to this game, Samuels's dot ball percentage was beginning to concern the dressing room. At one stage, he was batting on 9 off 31 deliveries as the spin duo of Moeen Ali and Adil Rashid stifled him. England finished the series with a favouring scoreline of 4-0.
Brief scores: Windies 288/6 in 50 overs (Shai Hope 72, Chris Gayle 40; Liam Plunkett 2-54, Moeen Ali 1-36) lost to England 294/1 in 38 overs (Jonny Bairstow 141*, Jason Roy 96; Miguel Cummins 1-70) by nine wickets
