England v West Indies: second Test, day four – live! | Sport

17th over: West Indies 49-1 (Brathwaite 15, Joseph 20) Woakes squares Joseph up, trying to slip to midwicket but instead spitting out into the offside off the leading edge, but safely away for three behind point. Oooh, nearly a carbon copy to Brathwaite next up – three more through the cordon. Most frustrating for the bowler, who is looking dangerous early on here. DROPPED CATCH! Oh dear, that’s a pretty straightforward chance for Stokes at second slip to his right. Yes, Crawley edging into his line of sight from third slip, but it wasn’t coming quickly from the edge of Joseph’s bat. Perhaps it was too slowly and he had too long to think? In any case, the chance goes down. As is the custom after something like that, a boundary follows to finish, Brathwaite glancing Woakes away fine. 13 off an over when Woakes found three legitimate edges. It is a batsmans’ game and never forget it.

“Hi Adam.” Morning, Ian Forth. “Do I remember this right? When I was a lad, test matches used to start at 11.30 (and there was a rest day). But on the final morning, it was 11a.m. What on earth was the logic behind that?”

I know from Calling the Shots research that 11:30am was the standard starting time for the longest time, but have never heard the 11am bit. Anyone have that to hand?

16th over: West Indies 36-1 (Brathwaite 6, Joseph 16) Now Broad with the headband, who has swung himself around to the Statham End. Athers explains that there was a strong breeze on Friday but not much now, allowing the attack-leader to return to end he usually bowls from at this ground when Anderson is in the team. Joseph gets his first run of the day from the first ball he faces, a single behind point. Back to Brathwaite, who leaves to begin before Broad really sprays one, heading to the right of Root at first slip when Buttler gets his glove in there to parry it away; a couple of wides added to the total. We saw Shannon Gabriel put a couple of deliveries in that direction but you don’t expect it from Broad. Joseph on strike once more and he gets another single, nicely timed through the gap at midwicket.

“Hi Adam.” Hello, Peter Salmon. “Surely the ideal situation for us OBOers would be the Windies rolled for about 180 and then England failing to enforce the follow on. Then making a sluggish 7/150 and it ending in a draw. Imagine the exasperation we could share! Proper cricket.” We should be so lucky, my friend.

15th over: West Indies 32-1 (Brathwaite 6, Joseph 14) Ball on bat, the first two deliveries clipped to fielders on the legside, Woakes then nearly squaring up Brathwaite, who plays him with soft hands. Ooh, and there’s the leg-cutter, hitting the seam and beating the edge. Not a lot of bounce but plenty of movement. To finish, more bounce on that same nagging line, well left by the opener. Nice start.

The players are on the field! And we’re ready to go. Nasser Hussain is ringing the pavilion bell and Chris Woakes is at the top of his mark. The West Indies resume on 32-1, some 437 runs behind the hosts. Kraigg Brathwaite is the man on strike, resuming on 6. He has Alzarri Joseph with him, the nightwatchman 14. PLAY!

“G’mornin Adam, g’mornin all.” Hi, Dean Kinsella. “So the photo shows a fair bit of cloud cover this morning. Looking forward to seeing Jimmy hooping it about on his home ground and. Oh wait.” It’s sunny now! But, yes. I wonder, if they knew about Archer earlier, whether Anderson would have been in this XI. On the other hand, as Silverwood has hinted, it’s about getting him safely fit for four Tests this summer.

Before we begin, an excellent Vic Marks column on Stokes and Botham. I’m not posting this to start a discussion about the House of Lords, by the way – for the sake of all of our mental health, let’s leave that one well alone today.

“Morning Collo; morning everyone. Love channelling my inner Benaud.” Iain McKane, hello to you. “I’ve a feeling Sam Curran and Bess will “come to the party” more tomorrow; today, I’m looking particularly at Broad and Stokes to make the major breakthroughs. Here’s hoping, though, that the West Indies batsmen make a real fight of things and we get a finish, late tomorrow, to match the brilliance of the First Test at The Ageas. Enjoy, Sir!”

As Vish Ehantharajah – formerly of the OBO parish – noted in his piece last night, if you need wickets in a hurry, who are going to call? Stuart Broad.

Ed Clarke has some additional information on starting earlier: “There is also the whole ‘back-stage’ setup to take into account. Powering up and checking all cameras and communications and everything behind the scenes takes ages – I worked a test match at the Oval some years ago and were onsite at 6am for an 11am start.” Good to know. Yhey can do it – there’s a 10am start permitted in Australia rather than the late finish – but it comes down to what has been agreed.

Lovely, sunny day in Manchester. Watching the telly, and taking a look at the forecast, there will be no issue with rain today. Let’s get those 98 overs in. Meanwhile, Michael Holding and Ian Bishop are talking with Nas about their distinctive approaches to the crease on Sky Cricket. Outstanding coverage.

Good question about any flexibility they might be able to build into Pakistan Test series, coming up in August. I’ll find out from the ECB after this match.

“Hi Adam.” G’day, Avitaj Mitra. “Since yesterday’s play was entirely washed out, and this is now, in effect, a 4 day match.. shouldn’t the follow on mark be 319 and not 269?”

Good shout but not quite. If the Test had been reduced to four-days before it started – i.e. had the first day been washed out – I believe this would be the case. It’s certainly how they do it in First Class cricket: I was commentating a three-day game between Northants and the touring Australians in 2015 where the follow-on was reduced to 100 after day one was washed out. However, not once the game begins.

“Hi Adam!” Morning, Sam Rhodes. “Pleasure to be reading your work, and I’m a big fan of The Final Word.” Why, thank you! “Given states of flux invite aimless crystal ball-gazing, I’m seeing a future where the West Indies are skittled at around 11.15 tomorrow for 271. Obviously they’ve avoided the follow on, but there’s still time to take ten more wickets if England bowl well. How much do you (and the broader OBO parish) think England would want to set them in order to keep the Wisden trophy alive? Would we see an instant declaration, or perhaps a quickfire fifty from Stokes and Buttler? Normally I’d expect England to take the draw, but with the series dead with any result other than an England win, we might see some quite tantalising aggression.”

I like your speculation – I like it a lot. In that scenario, sending Buttler/Stokes out with a mandate to go wild for an hour to put the chase out of reach but leave 60-odd overs, well, it would keep things interesting! And would be good for Jos.

On that theme, our first message of the day is a frustrated one, from @Katie_Allen: “It’s INFURIATING that they aren’t playing already – they’re all there, there’s no spectators or public transport to consider, they can just roll out of bed and out to the pitch.”

The boring answer is that they can’t modify the playing conditions after they have been agreed before the Test/series – or, indeed the World Test Championship. You might have seen my story the other day about front-foot no-balls going to the TV umpire for ICC events. Well, this is an ICC event, part of the WTC. However, they already agreed to the conditions for this cycle so the status quo prevails for now.

You broader point about playing times, though, will surely form a bigger part of the conversation into the future. It’s clear fans want more flexibility on days like this.

Session times. So, as I said below, 98 overs can be bowled today. It’s one of those quirks that if it rains during a day, the scheduled closed can be pushed to 7pm before the 30 extra minutes. However, when they are making up time from earlier, only half an hour is available before the extra half an hour that takes us to the 7pm.

• First session: 1100-1300
• Second session: 1340 – 1555
• Third session: 1615 – 1830

Make sense? Good.