An in-form West Indies finally met their match in South Africa at Narendra Modi Stadium, Ahmedabad. After the high of 254/6 against Zimbabwe, West Indies batters threw caution into the wind and looked to put Proteas bowlers under pressure straightaway. But Aiden Markram’s men had their plans set and ready for execution. The wickets kept falling and West Indies found themselves staring down the barrel at 83/7 after 10.2 overs. That’s when tall hard-hitting all-rounders Jason Holder and Romario Shepherd came to West Indies' rescue. They shared a record-breaking highest eighth-wicket partnership to take West Indies to a challenging total, giving the bowlers something to defend in the Super 8 clash.
The 89-run partnership from 57 balls is the highest for the ninth wicket in T20I history. They broke the record created by Scotland's Preston Mommsen and Safyaan Sharif who shared an 80-run stand against Netherlands in July 2015. In T20 World Cup history, the record was held by Namibia's Ruben Trumpelmann and David Wiese with a 70-run stand against UAE in the 2022 edition. For West Indies, the previous T20I record was a 67-run stand between Rovman Powell and Shepherd against Bangladesh in 2024.
While Holder fell for a 31-ball 49 on the penultimate delivery of the innings, run out in an attempt to take a single via byes. His knock featured four fours and three sixes. Shepherd got the strike and got to his fifty with a boundary via an inside edge off the last ball of the innings. He whacked four sixes and three fours in his unbeaten 37-ball 52, helping the Caribbean side post 176/8.
Shepherd 3rd to achieve rare T20I feat
Meanwhile, Shepherd became the third batter to score a T20I fifty at no.9. Last year in May, Austria's Hamid Safi scored an unbeaten 58 off 18 balls against Slovenia. In the same month, Bangladesh's Tanzim Hasan Sakib scored 50 runs from 31 balls against Pakistan. Shepherd held the record for previous highest score by a no.9 West Indies batter in T20Is as well. He had scored an unbeaten 44 from 22 balls against South Africa in Johannesburg in 2023.
But, Shepherd is the first to achieve the feat in T20 World Cups. Afghanistan's Shafiqullah held the previous record with an unbeaten 23-ball 35 against England in the 2016 edition of T20 World Cup.