Mark Wood took the final five West Indies wickets in a devastating spell of fast bowling before Ben Stokes struck a blistering 24-ball fifty as England raced to a 10-wicket win at Edgbaston to clinch a 3-0 series sweep.
Wood (5-40) bowled without luck to start day three, but returned after lunch to take five wickets for just nine runs in the space of six overs – Alzarri Joseph and Jayden Seales seeing their stumps sent cartwheeling out of the ground.
Mikyle Louis (57) and Kavem Hodge (55) had earlier shown a fair bit of fight with battling half centuries – a first in Test cricket for the former – as the West Indies earned a slender lead.
But England captain Ben Stokes made light work of knocking off the 82 required as he filled in at the top of the order for Zak Crawley, absent while getting his right index finger scanned after injuring it in the morning session.
Stokes (55no off 28 balls) smashed nine boundaries and one six in scoring the fastest-ever Test fifty for England as the hosts reached their target in just 7.2 overs to clinch a series whitewash in the most spectacular fashion.
West Indies resumed the day 33-2 in their second innings, still some 61 runs in arrears, and England swiftly strengthened their position with the wicket of Alick Athanaze (12) in the seventh over of the day, lbw to Shoaib Bashir (1-41), shortly after he was dropped by Harry Brook off Wood the over before.
Hodge was then also put down, first ball, as another hugely tough chance burst past the outstretched left hand of Joe Root.
He made the most of his reprieve, throwing a few counter punches to see the West Indies into a lead. Louis too began to free his arms, bringing up his maiden Test fifty with the first of two glorious straight sixes off Bashir.
But, just as he was beginning to enjoy himself, Stokes (1-42) provided the breakthrough by tempting Louis into a routine nick behind to Jamie Smith.
Crawley sustained his injury when dropping Jason Holder on 12 at second slip, but the error would not cost England as Gus Atkinson (2-28) got his man in the very next over without adding to his score – the former West Indies captain a touch unfortunate to see ‘umpire’s call’ go against him on a marginal lbw that was just clipping leg stump.
Hodge had brought up an enterprising 56-ball half century the ball before, but he was kept to only three runs from 18 deliveries after lunch as he was both starved of the strike and found scoring infinitely tougher in the midst of Wood’s match-winning spell.
With the ball reverse-swinging, Wood first trapped the dogged Joshua Da Silva (5), before bowling Alzarri (2) with a brutal, toe-crusher of a yorker that took out his middle stump.
Quick as a flash, the West Indies innings was then ended with three wickets in an over as Hodge nicked off and then Seales saw his off stump flattened and Shamar Joseph thick-edged a drive to Brook.
A mere 7.2 overs later, the match was over courtesy of Stokes’ 24-ball fifty that briefly threatened to break Misbah-ul-Haq’s 21-ball Test record.
Ben Duckett (25no off 16) certainly played second fiddle to his skipper, but contributed a flurry of four boundaries in one Holder over before Stokes fittingly hit the winning run.
England’s Test series vs West Indies
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