England vs West Indies: Jason Holder stars for visitors as hosts are done for by tea on day two

Full lengths, decent bounce and enough movement both ways. Cricket might have been away for a while, but it remains a straightforward game in principle. But few are able to put that into practice in the manner Jason Holder did here.

A bit of seam from wide of the crease got Zak Crawley’s head over to the off side and his front in front of middle. A shorter length to Ollie Pope – harder to pick up from a high arm on a six-foot-seven frame – brought with it indeterminate footwork and a flick through to wicketkeeper Shane Dowrich. Stand-in captain and vice, Ben Stokes and Jos Buttler, were similarly undone. Jofra Archer was number five, and then Mark Wood’s skew to gully made it six.

A career-best for Holder of six for 42 and a seventh set of five wickets in Tests, and just as we have been accustomed to this kind of work from Holder – six of those hauls have come since January 2018 – so too have we become accustomed to our protagonist directing us to the bigger picture. Here, it was an England first innings done for by tea on day two, dismissed for 204: Holder helping knock down the final five wickets for 50 runs after Shannon Gabriel’s three wickets up top set them up by accounting for the entire top there for just 51.

But for a breezy partnership of 67 between Stokes and Buttler, things could have been better. And had they taken chances to remove Stokes on 14 (dropped at deep backward square leg by Kemar Roach off Alzarri Joseph) or 32 (shelled at cover by Shamarah Brooks off Roach), you could say with more confidence that their position of 57 for one at stumps has them well in control of the match.

Instead, it remains less so in their favour, but very much more in their possession than England’s. And while previous iterations of this West Indies side may have you primed for a flip, Holder’s tenure is one of greater stability.

For now, it’s worth putting the man himself into proper context. We can talk about West Indies captains needing to be statesmen, facilitators and with the sensitivity to “bring the islands together” without really knowing what any of those things actually mean. But the numbers tell a pretty clear story – of an outlier in more than one sense.

Since 2018, his 59 wickets have come at 13.49 and, for now, 680 ruins at 42.50. Today’s haul took him over 151 dismissals against England which, coupled with a double century at Bridgeton in 2019, makes him the second entry into a club that only had the legendary Frank Worrell as a member.

But the period from 2018 is worth looking into more deeply. For Holder, the ICC’s number one ranked all-rounder, has only played 12 Tests in that time. Number two on that list, Stokes, has played twice as many. Ravi Jadeja, in at number three has missed 10 Tests in that time and still turned out for 14. The narrative that he is underrated isn’t quite right – he is just under-played.

A further oddity is his diminishing white-ball appeal. West Indies rely a lot less of him in their stronger formats. He’s made 45 out of a possible 52 ODI XIs and just nine of 32 in T20is. What worries of limited overs distractions are no worries of his.

But it does make you wonder what kind of legacy Holder will leave? He is someone who, to an extent, has not had to be swayed by the skewed economics teams like West Indies have to deal with in the game’s current structure. And as such he – his career, his self – is the sort everyone else wants a West Indian cricketer to be. An entitled attitude born of nostalgia that he rallies against while his career conforms.

And yet, the future of Test cricket is more reliant on players like him and Virat Kohli, whose brilliance bonds Indians and Caribbean fans to the longest format. The responsibility can be a burden, but it does not show in either.

Holder remains ever studious. The upturn in his bowling has come, he says, from observing others. Of Jimmy Anderson’s patience and Glenn McGrath’s consistency – and, most importantly, putting it into practice. The former could only find one wicket today, mind: a third attempt at an LBW of John Campbell finally confirmed after DRS had struck off the first two.

When Holder was asked to turn praise onto himself, he rebuffed, offering simply: “I really want to make some runs.” Typically for him, there is always more to do.

Not everybody wants to be everything to everyone. Not everybody *should* be. But Holder wants to be and few can argue that he isn’t to West Indies and cricket right now.

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