England make inroads to close in on series sweep

England crept closer to a series sweep over the West Indies as they chalked off three more wickets on the third morning at Edgbaston.

The third Test looks certain to go the same way as its predecessors at Lord’s and Trent Bridge, with the tourists unable to consistently compete against a side who refuse to let them off the leash.

At lunch they were 151 for five in their second innings, just 57 ahead, after Shoaib Bashir, Ben Stokes and Gus Atkinson took one apiece.

Mikyle Louis (57) and Kavem Hodge (52no) brought the fight but it will take a lot more where that came from to leave England looking over their shoulders.

Resuming with the score on 33 for two the hosts opened up with spin and speed, Bashir setting up camp at the Birmingham End and Mark Wood kicking off with a five-over blast of pace.

The variation worked a treat to unsettle Alick Athanaze, who was hit on the body by a short ball from Wood then mistimed a sweep against Bashir and fell lbw for 12.

Exactly a week ago in Nottingham the West Indies collapsed in a heap in the their second innings and the early wicket raised the prospect of another Sunday surrender.

That could well have happened when Hodge nicked his first ball, a tester from Bashir, but it flew between wicketkeeper Jamie Smith and Joe Root at first slip and skipped away for four.

Hodge, coming off a first-innings duck, was just as fortunate with his second scoring shot, another edge off Wood finding its way past the cordon. Good luck soon gave way to good judgement, though, as he began to assert himself on the situation.

He took back-to-back boundaries off Wood, playing back then pressing forward in anticipation, and hit two more off Stokes as the skipper targeted the stumps.

After an hour’s play the scores were level and Louis took that as a sign to shift up a gear. Twice he smashed Bashir down the ground for six, the first of which took him to 50 in joyous fashion.

His fun was about to end though. Stokes had been working himself into a strong rhythm, sending down his fastest recorded spell for four years, and got something to show for it when he forced through an away swinger on a fourth-stump line. Louis was drawn in, Zak Crawley swallowed the catch at second slip and England were on the move again.

Crawley’s hands let him down when Jason Holder offered another chance off Stokes but Atkinson spared his team-mate’s blushes in the very next over as he pinned the all-rounder lbw.