Australia managed to take the lead in the two-match Test series after the visiting West Indies lost the first match by 164 runs.
In the first game, Kyle Meyers, Jayden Seals, and Kemar Roach were injured, and Marquino Mindley was also injured. Therefore, 33-year-old Devon Thomas was called into the squad.
“I hadn’t bowled in five months (before the tour). So coming here, I’m a bit stiff.” Thomas said
In the second match, Australia scored 511 runs for the loss of 7 wickets in their first innings. It was Thomas who finished the first innings of the second Test as the best bowler of the West Indies team. He took 2-53 in 14 overs.
Thomas said,
“When I got a first wicket, Khawaja, I looked at his stats and realised he averages 91 (Khawaja averages 85.08 this year). So he was a good first wicket.”
Also,
“I used to play and bowl on the beach, I used to play a lot of beach cricket. I started my career bowling off-spin but then after a wicketkeeper got injured, I said I’d take up wicketkeeping from there.”
“I was bowling in the nets, I think in 2016 I bowled to Australia in the nets in Antigua when they had a tour there. I got a few wickets. They didn’t want to face me at the time. I bowled a lot quicker.”
Thomas’s dismissal of Khawaja was enough to pique the interest of injured Australian paceman Pat Cummins, who approached him in the warm-up ahead of day two.
“He was just telling me, what else can you do? If I could dance as well as bowling, ‘keep.” Thomas explained.
“I said I could dance … but I can’t sing.”