West Indies captain Shai Hope continued his ascent in his best format, the ODIs, as he slammed his 17th century in 50-over matches as he led from the front in the second ODI against England in Antigua on Saturday, November 2. Hope, who came in to bat when the match had almost ended in the first ODI, made it count on Saturday after England opted to bowl first. After the openers were quickly back in the hut, Hope forged a crucial 143-run stand with Keacy Carty to lift the West Indies and their first innings total.
Hope and Carty both weren't afraid to play their shots, however, the latter kept the tempo up while the skipper was watchful. Both smashed their fifties before Adil Rashid broke the partnership. It didn't affect Hope as he continued on his merry way and Sherfane Rutheford took care of the run rate. Hope got to his century off 118 balls before he too started smashing.
This was Hope's 17th century in the format, the joint-third most for the West Indies in ODIs as he equalled Desmond Haynes's record in nearly half the number of innings and now is only behind the likes of Chris Gayle and Brian Lara.
In the ongoing decade, since the start of 2020, Hope has now the most number of ODI centuries as he went past Babar Azam, who has eight hundreds to his name in the format in this period. Hope has now nine ODI hundreds since 2020 and left Babar and Virat Kohli behind.
Most ODI hundreds since 2020
9 - Shai Hope
8 - Babar Azam
7 - Quinton de Kock, Fakhar Zaman, Virat Kohli, Rahmanullah Gurbaz
Most ODI Hundreds for West Indies
25 - Chris Gayle (291 innings)
19 - Brian Lara (285 innings)
17* - Shai Hope (124 innings)
17 - Desmond Haynes (237 innings)
Apart from Sherfane Rutherford, the late cameo from Matthew Forde hitting three sixes in the final over helped the West Indies to get to a score of 328 and it will take some getting from England, who lost the series opener and are in a must-win situation to stay alive.
