West Indies all-rounder Justin Greaves wrote his name into cricket history on the first day of the World Test Championship on July 10th (2014) at the Brian Lara Cricket Academy in Tarouba, Trinidad, when he took five wickets in five consecutive maiden overs of Test cricket. With a masterful skill and relentless hostility, the 32-year-old Barbadian seamer was the first bowler in the history of Test cricket to take five wickets in five consecutive maiden overs. It was a career-changing performance that turned the game around in which he completely dismantled Pakistan’s attack and took five wickets in the longest format of the game.
The historic sequence broke a decade-old international record that had been held by former England fast bowler Stuart Broad of four consecutive wicket maidens - in Johannesburg in 2016. Greaves did this with a masterclass of careful line and length on a pitch that had subtle movement but also rewarded long seam bowling.
Before Greaves intervened, Pakistan had taken control of the match on the third day. Starting their first innings in response to the West Indies' 311, the visitors were 244-3 and on track with the first-innings lead. Pakistan's former captain Shan Masood was a great batsman, and the century he made was an excellent innings that put his team in a good position. Shamar Joseph took over early in the day to remove Salman Agha but Pakistan was in a good position.
That was when captain Roston Chase called Greaves out and told him to keep cool and look at the opposition’s defence. That decision was an inspired turning point. Greaves quickly broke the resistance and Masood’s mistake that the centurion was to chop the ball back onto his stumps for 109. This breakthrough opened the floodgates and led to a wonderful collapse.
Greaves played the game very well and took a wicket in each of his next four overs and none of them produced a single run. He bowled a fast Aamer Jamal with a straight delivery that jagged back sharply, trapped Ali Usman leg-before-wicket for a duck, and induced an edge behind from wicketkeeper-batter Mohammad Rizwan. By lunch Pakistan had lost five wickets for 23 runs and were stumbling from a healthy position of 267-8.
Greaves accomplished his remarkable feat just after the interval. In the first over of the afternoon session he struck the outside edge of Mohammad Abbas’s bat, sending the ball safely through to the keeper and locking in his fifth consecutive wicket maiden. Pakistan were bundled out for 282, just 29 runs short of the West Indies' first-innings score. Greaves finished with 5-27 from 11 brilliant overs, including six maidens.
Receiving his historic achievement on the day's play, a humble Greaves was quick to thank his team-first attitude and captain’s support. Whenever he has the ball in hand he does his job as a stabilizing force and digs the team out of trouble. The day was for the Barbadian all-rounder, but the Test match itself was still quite a delicate balancing act at stumps. Pakistan fought back in the last session and reduced the West Indies to 126-7 in the second innings but the hosts still had a 155 runs lead at the end of the day.
