Smith's 95 puts England on top in third Test

Third Rothesay Test (day two of five), Edgbaston

West Indies 282 (Brathwaite 61; Atkinson 4-67) & 33-2 (Louis 18*; Woakes 1-8)

England: 376 (Smith 95, Root 87; Joseph 4-122, Seales 3-79)

West Indies trail by 61 runs

Scorecard

Jamie Smith’s dazzling 95 helped England seize control of the third Test against West Indies on a compelling second day at Edgbaston.

Smith’s aggressive knock, off 109 balls, included 12 fours and one six as England resolutely compiled 376 in response to West Indies’ first-innings total of 282.

West Indies lost skipper Kraigg Brathwaite and Kirk McKenzie cheaply in the final hour of the day as they reached stumps on 33-2 – 61 runs behind England.

The tourists had earlier made an electric start in the morning session after they quickly captured the wickets of Ollie Pope and Harry Brook to leave England reeling at 54-5.

Calm heads were needed and England’s two most experienced batters – Joe Root and skipper Ben Stokes (54) – duly delivered a composed 115-run stand for the sixth wicket to spearhead the fightback.

Wicketkeeper Smith upped the ante as he and Chris Woakes (62) firmly wrestled the initiative in England’s favour with some fluent strokeplay, cheered on by a raucous crowd.

England's day would have been even better had Stokes not dropped a simple catch to dismiss West Indies opener Mikyle Louis, who will resume on day three with Alick Athanaze.

At the start of the series England ruthlessly dispensed with Jonny Bairstow and gave Smith wicketkeeping duties ahead of Ben Foakes, his Surrey team-mate.

This was precisely the kind of performance with the bat that Brendon McCullum and Stokes would have had in mind when they made that call.

Smith had shown his promise on the Test stage with 70 on his debut in the first match at Lord’s.

On that occasion he showed intelligent match awareness to move through the gears and advance England from a good position to an excellent one in a pressure-free situation.

Given the scoreboard when he arrived here at Edgbaston – 231-7 and a deficit of 51 runs – this constituted an innings of much greater substance, and significance.

Smith set the tone when he powerfully whipped a short one aimed at his ribcage from Alzarri Joseph over the roof of the Eric Hollies Stand off just the 11th ball he faced.

He brought up his second Test half-century off 60 balls then took Joseph to the cleaners again, ruthlessly pummelling three wasteful deliveries on legs in the same over for four.

It was going to take a piece of fine bowling, or a freak dismissal, to dislodge Smith as he eyed a maiden Test hundred.

Shamar Joseph flummoxed him with the latter as a short-pitched delivery bounced low and went through to hit the stumps with Smith already committed to pull a ball he expected to be chest height.

Up on the England balcony Stokes theatrically threw his head back in despair, almost disbelief, before he too joined the rest of a well-oiled crowd in applauding a fine knock.

There was a sense that this was the day Smith had produced a breakthrough innings.

He even had the gloss of a catch behind the stumps late in the day when McKenzie nicked a delivery from Gus Atkinson after Woakes had removed Brathwaite’s off stump for a duck.

The panic button had been pushed when Pope chopped Shamar Joseph onto his stumps and then six balls later Brook edged Jayden Seales into the gloves of Joshua Da Silva.

Root himself had an early stroke of fortune before either wicket fell, benefitting from a lack of West Indies conviction when he was hit on the pad on the 10th ball of the day by an inswinger from Seales as he got his feet stuck and overbalanced attempting to defend.

Seales and Kraigg Brathwaite seemed concerned with height and the West Indies captain opted against sending it upstairs, only for the ball-tracking technology to show it would have hit the top of leg stump.

On such fine margins are Test matches sometimes won and lost, and from that point Root was near-chanceless until the middle of the afternoon session.

On a ground where Brian Lara is so venerated it was fitting he leapfrogged the legendary Trinidadian left-hander, who was watching in the stands, to seventh place the list of all-time leading Test run-scorers.

It was an innings which has the classical hallmarks of Root at his pomp. The type of strokeplay admired by all and sundry down the years.

Much has been made of Root’s role within the Bazball paradigm yet the solution has always been clear: just be Joe Root.

Deft accumulation almost by stealth, with rarely a lose shot in sight, took him zen-like beyond 12,000 runs.

A 33rd Test hundred, and the chance to level with Sir Alastair Cook’s tally of centuries, beckoned for the 33-year-old.

Ultimately he was undone by a smart piece of bowling 13 runs shy when left-arm spinner Gudakesh Motie’s arm ball skipped on to his back pad and trap him plumb lbw.

However, it is only a matter of time before he eclipses all of Cook’s batting records and more side. Kumar Sangakkara, who has 12,400 Test runs, is the next target.