Part-time seamer Sherfane Rutherford was forced to bowl four overs at the death of England's innings in the deciding match of the ODI series in the Caribbean today (November 6), after an injury to Romario Shepherd left the West Indies light on bowling options.
Shepherd picked up an injury bowling the first ball of the 42nd over. His studs caught in the ground as he ran into the crease and he ended up face down on the floor He had to be helped off the field, and to add insult to injury, he somehow still bowled a legal delivery, which looped up for Dan Mousley to smash it behind square for four. Given their lack of bowling options in the top six, the West Indies' only option was to turn to Rutherford.
In eight ODI appearances, Rutherford has only sent down four overs, though he has taken two wickets from them. He has a List A bowling average of 43.33.
At the time of the injury to Shepherd, England were 168-6, and looking to push their total as close to 250 as possible. While Rutherford's five balls to complete Shepherd's over were not massively promising, a wide and eight runs coming from them, it wasn't disaster stations yet. His next over was also relatively tidy, with six legal deliveries and only six runs from it. However, after making way for Matthew Forde for an over, it started go down hill for Rutherford when he came back on to bowl the 48th.
He bowled two wides, with eight runs coming from his first three legal balls. Jofra Archer then pumped the fourth delivery of the over for six over long on before taking a single off the last ball. After Forde bowled Jamie Overton with the final ball of his last over, Rutherford was left to bowl the last over of the innings, with England still yet to reach 250 on 238-8.
Rutherford started well with a dot, and was unlucky off his next ball, which Shimron Hetmyer misfielded in the deep to let it through to the boundary. His next ball, was launched over deep-square leg by Archer for six. Rutherford bowled an above waist-height full-toss as his next ball, which was slapped for four by Archer, before the free-hit was again sent over the deep-square leg boundary for another six.
Four runs came off the last two balls to take England to 263-8, with 44 runs coming off Rutherford's last two overs, 25 of them off his last. He was left with figures of 0-57 off 3.5 overs, and an economy rate of 14.86. None of West Indies' full-time bowlers conceded more than 50 in their full allocations.
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