Geoff Lemon's Blog, page 2

Cameron Green plays lone hand as Australia batting woes worsen in West Indies

Third Test, day two: Australia 225 and 99-6; West Indies 143 at stumps

No 3 batter hits 42 not out after Sam Konstas falls for a duck

The third Test in Jamaica continued to move at hectic pace through the second day and night despite the slow speed of West Indies’ scoring, with 16 wickets falling in 81.1 overs to all but ensure the match will end on day three. After bowling out West Indies for a meagre 143, Australia’s third innings was a reciprocally woeful 99 for 6 by stumps, with a not out Cameron Green the lone point of resistance among the top order.

That means Australia’s final innings of the series completed an unhappily familiar pattern for struggling openers Sam Konstas and Usman Khawaja. In each of the three matches, they have batted first and been dismissed cheaply on day one, then been back at the crease for a second dismissal before the end of day two.

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Pressure mounts on Konstas and Khawaja as Australia collapse against West Indies

Third Test, day one: Australia win toss and make 225; West Indies 16-1

Australia openers again fail to fire in day-night Test at Sabina Park

It was a strange way to start. Out of Australia’s last 146 Test matches before taking the field at Sabina Park in Jamaica on Saturday, off spinner Nathan Lyon had missed seven. Four of those were in 2012 and 2013, left out for other configurations of bowlers. Three were after he blew out his calf during the 2023 Ashes. And that was that.

Surprisingly, Kingston became the eighth match that Lyon has missed in his 14 years of Tests, and the fifth when fit, after a series in which he has gone for a few sixes but taken nine wickets at 18. Instead Australia opted to include Scott Boland as the fourth fast bowler for a day-night fixture on a surface that they guessed would suit pace.

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Third Test’s day-night format should feel like home turf for Australia in Kingston | Geoff Lemon

The series against West Indies may be decided but every Test counts, as long as Sabina Park’s lights shine bright enough

It’s a strange concept, in a region known for sunshine, to end a Caribbean tour with a day-night Test. It’s stranger still to choose Kingston, Jamaica, a venue that until a couple of months ago didn’t even have floodlights. Up until two days before the match, there has been local conjecture about whether they would be adequate for the match, with a chance that plans would have to be changed. But one day out, the lights have been announced fit by sports minister Olivia Grange.

Putting the pieces together, it’s likely related to Jamaica’s upcoming election and a sitting government that has worn plenty of whacks for not supporting cricket, having refused to bid for matches at last year’s T20 World Cup citing expense. A cricket spectacle might be an attempt to recover some ground. It helps that Mexico, Canada, and the USA have host qualification for next year’s football World Cup, opening up a potential spot for Jamaica’s Reggae Boyz, who have also used Sabina Park recently.

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Remorseless Australian bowling onslaught blows away West Indies in second Test

Second Test, day four: Australia 286 & 243; West Indies 253 & 143

Australia win by 133 runs to claim series victory in Grenada

The second Test in Grenada finished like the first in Barbados, with a batting performance as shambolic and uninspired from the home side as their bowling had been impressive. Everybody is bored of the eulogies for West Indies cricket: we’ve all been reading them for 25 years, and some of us have been writing them for what feels as long. But it doesn’t matter how many times you’ve seen The Shawshank Redemption, you still feel a pang of sadness when Tommy Williams steps out to meet Warden Norton for a midnight chat.

Australia shot down West Indies with as little remorse, all out for 143 in less than 35 overs on day four, the visitors winning by 133 runs at the Grenada National Stadium and going 2-0 up to win the series. It’s not that the scoreline is a surprise, given the resource disparity between the teams and administrations, but it still feels wrong to feel that a Test side has no chance of chasing once a target approaches 250.

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Smith and Head build Australia’s lead over West Indies after Green steadies ship

Second Test, D3: Australia 286 and 221-7; West Indies 253

Smith (71), Green (52) and Head (39) shine on rain-affected day

Finally, in a helter-skelter series, something approaching a normal day’s Test cricket took place. In the second Test against West Indies in Grenada, Australia added 209 for five after resuming at a vulnerable 12 for two, taking their overall lead out to 254. The normality of the score is masked by the fact that several tropical rain delays kept play to 58.3 overs, so a full day’s play would likely have seen Australia bowled out and West Indies at least commencing the fourth innings. As it is, this match will now make it into a fourth day.

It was Cameron Green and Steve Smith who created that sense of normality, after the nightwatch Nathan Lyon hung around for almost an hour before nicking Alzarri Joseph to third slip on eight. The fact that John Campbell held the catch in a faulty cordon was a boost for West Indies, but Green and Smith tamped that back down. Green had the occasional problem, with an inside edge past the stumps or a sharply lifting ball, but produced the most convincing innings of his brief foray to No 3 in the batting order, moving to 52 with the occasional powerful cut shot, and otherwise a lot of forward defence and working the ball around.

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Scrutiny of Sam Konstas ramps up as West Indies keep second Test alive | Geoff Lemon

Australia’s top order has more question marks than the Riddler’s pants after Konstas and Usman Khawaja again failed to deliver

As so often in Test cricket, drama saved itself for the dying overs of the day. With 90 remaining minutes ticking down towards 60 on the second day of the second Test in Grenada, tactically minded onlookers started to think about West Indies’ last-wicket partnership. Anderson Phillip and Jayden Seales were defending with heart, on their way to facing 65 balls and adding 16 runs. With Australia having made 286 the previous day, their stand took West Indies from 49 runs behind to 33. But each over that they chose to keep batting rather than swing for runs, they reduced the time available to bowl at an Australian top order under pressure.

In the end, there were 30 minutes left when Australia began the third innings. And in the end, that was enough to account for both openers, raising the tension another notch with only two more opportunities for them to bat in a Test before the Ashes. So much attention has been on young Sam Konstas, after struggles in Barbados and a briefly improved showing in the first innings here. He has only once before faced the pressure of a brief late Tests innings, in Sydney when he foolishly provoked Jasprit Bumrah and brought about Usman Khawaja’s wicket next ball.

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Carey and Webster steady Australia after more batting woe in West Indies

Second Test, day one: Australia win toss and make 286 at stumps

Tourists had slumped to 93-4; Steve Smith dismissed for three

Same bat time, same bat channel. That’s the feeling for Australia at the moment, as normal programming followed normal programming: top order failure, middle order digging the team out of a hole, a score that shouldn’t be enough against a proper batting side but might well be enough against a vulnerable one. As the second Test against West Indies began on the small island of Grenada on Thursday, a reasonable start of 47 without loss abruptly became 50-3, and 110-5, before finally recovering to 286 all out, on a hot tropical day when occasional rain bursts created short delays, and bad light prevented a late tilt against West Indies’ top order.

Given how rarely the Grenada National Stadium is used, the surface was an unknown quantity. West Indies picked a fifth quick, Australia shrugged and picked the same four bowlers they would choose for St Moritz ice cricket if the chance came up. Dry, patchy, straw coloured, that pitch initially looked the sort where a couple of batters in need of a score could cash in. The pace looked slow, attempted bouncers barely reached the waist. Sam Konstas laid into the first of those he received, Usman Khawaja soon followed with some pulled boundaries of his own.

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Beau Webster’s dependability should give heart to Australia’s Test hopefuls new and old

Sam Konstas has been backed to open again and can look to Webster’s example of composure and calm at the crease

Australia’s bowlers rescued the first Test against West Indies in Barbados, so the team will be relieved to welcome back blue-chip batter Steve Smith for the second Test in Grenada. In London a fortnight ago, a fielding mishap looked like it had caused Smith’s finger a horrific break, but instead the injury was a dislocation, and it has settled well enough for him to come safely through a net session in New York City. Smith will rejoin the team in Barbados on Sunday, with a final fitness check the day before the next fixture starting on 3 July.

Australian coach Andrew McDonald confirmed that Smith will slot straight back in at his preferred No 4 spot when available, which will mean that Josh Inglis has to make way after filling in and returning a rare failure with the bat in Australian colours. There are no other spots available, after McDonald backed Sam Konstas to open and Cameron Green at No 3, while praising the work in Bridgetown of Travis Head at No 5 and Beau Webster at No 6.

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Josh Hazlewood blitz sends Australia to victory inside three days in West Indies

First Test, day three: Australia 180 & 310; West Indies 190 & 141

Hazlewood picks up five wickets in 159-run victory in Bridgetown

It was an extraordinary final session to end the first Test in Barbados in the long shadows of the third evening. After two days of wobbles, a portion of Australia’s batting got its act together, with the lower-middle-order trio of Travis Head, Beau Webster, and Alex Carey making half centuries to lift Australia’s second innings to 310. That left West Indies needing 301 to win the first Test in Barbados, always unlikely on a Kensington Oval pitch that already had balls keeping low. Josh Hazlewood made sure of it with a withering burst of 4-4 in 16 balls, later upping that to 5-23, as West Indies crashed humiliatingly to 141 all out, losing by 159 runs.

Hazlewood has been the subject of some public attention of late, given his injury absences and how well Scott Boland has performed during each one. But the first-choice option has 288 Test wickets, took 35 of them at 13 last calendar year, and has nine at 18 in the two matches he has managed in 2025. His career against West Indies is worth 43 at 15, and over two tours to this part of the world he has 19 wickets at nine.

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Australia’s top order stutters again to leave first Test in West Indies finely balanced

Day two: Australia 180 & 92-4; West Indies 190 | Australia lead by 82

Beau Webster impresses with ball to keep West Indies in check

The wheel turned as the wheel so often has in Australia’s Tests the last couple of years: the batters under-delivered, the bowlers made it right. With the team having been bowled out for 180 on the first day of the first Test against West Indies in Barbados, Australia’s quicks turned around and returned the favour, keeping West Indies to 190, the lead to 10, and making the match a one-innings shootout in an often chaotic day. The second Australian batting effort then stuttered to 65-4, before improving the score by stumps to 92, a lead of 82.

Spare yet another thought for Shamar Joseph. In three career outings against Australia, the West Indies pace prodigy has been a bowling Mozart, but he runs towards a slip cordon with more drops than Tiësto. In the first innings after getting Sam Konstas lbw, his notional catchers put down chances from Cameron Green and Usman Khawaja in the space of 10 balls, and Nathan Lyon later in the innings. Second time around was even more galling: tearing in for his first over, hitting an irresistible line with pace, and having Konstas dropped twice in three balls.

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