Evin Lewis century seals series victory for West Indies in 2nd ODI

Evin Lewis scored a fine century against Sri Lanka in the second One Day International to help West Indies take a 2-0 lead and seal the series victory. The game went down to the wire in the 2nd ODI in Antigua as it took West Indies 49.4 overs to chase down Sri Lanka’s target of 273. The victory was set up by the West Indies openers Evin Lewis and Shai Hope, who registered their second century stand in a row. Pope and Lewis shared a stand of 143 in the first ODI and were able to better that with an opening partnership of 192 in 37.1 overs to take West Indies to victory.

After a poor batting effort in the 1st ODI where they were skittled for 232, Sri Lanka needed an improved batting effort in this game to stay alive in the series. The visitors had a poor start in the powerplay after some fine bowling by Alzarri Joseph left them reeling at 50-3. However, the pair of Danushka Gunathilika and Dinesh Chandimal help steadied the ship to put on a 100-run partnership for the fourth wicket. Gunathilika was eventually dismissed by Jason Mohammed for 96. His wicket triggered another mini-collapse for Sri Lanka but a fine cameo of 47 from 31 balls from Wanindu Hasaranga propelled Sri Lanka to a total of 273.

In their reply, the West Indies were cruising on their way to victory with a 192-run stand from openers Evin Lewis and Shai Hope. Lewis scored a century off 115 balls while Shai Hope made 84. However, they both were dismissed by Sri Lanka within two overs of each other which left West Indies needing 76 from the last 10 overs. From then on, the pressure kept building with three more quick wickets which brought the equation down to 46 from the last 5 overs.

Pooran and Fabian Allen eased the nerves after taking 18 runs from the 48th over off Nuwan Pradeep. However, only four runs were scored off the penultimate over which raised the tensions but Pooran hit eventually two boundaries in the final over to help the West Indies win by 5 wickets with two balls to spare.