West Indies put up a valiant fight in their follow-on against India in the second Test of the series, with John Campbell and Shai Hope slamming centuries in the second innings of the Delhi Test. After being asked to follow on with a trail of 270 on their back, the Windies put up their best effort with the bat as they toiled the Indian bowlers on a slow and low surface at the Arun Jaitley Stadium.
Campbell slammed his maiden Test hundred as he ended a long wait for a three-figure mark, while it was the same for Shai Hope, who hit only his third Test century and ended his own long wait. Campbell took 49 innings to score his maiden Test hundred as an opener, second longest after Trevor Goddard's 58-inning wait. Meanwhile, Campbell scored a hundred after a gap of 58 innings, which is the most for West Indies, going past Jermaine Blackwood's gap of 47 such outings.
Campbell, with his 115, and Hope, with his 103, have ended another long wait, too. For the first time after 51 years, two Windies batters have scored centuries in the second innings of a Test match in India. The last Windies batters to have done so were Gordon Greenidge and then captain Clive Lloyd, who had slammed 107 and 163 respectively in the Bengaluru Test in 1974.
This was also the first instance of a visiting pair scoring centuries in the second innings of a Test match after Ian Bell and Jonathan Trott had done so in the Nagpur Test in 2012. For the Windies, the last time two batters scored a century in the second innings of the Test was when Shane Dowrich and Jason Holder had done so against England in Bridgetown in 2019.
Two West Indies batters scoring second innings centuries in India in the same match:
1 - John Campbell and Shai Hope in Delhi Test 2025
2 - Gordon Greenidge and Clive Lloyd in the Bengaluru Test in 1974
3 - Everton Weekes and Clyde Walcott in the Eden Gardens Test in 1948
The two centurions also put up a stand of 177 for the third wicket in the Windies' fightback with the bat. Campbell's stay came to an end when Ravindra Jadeja trapped him in front as he missed his reverse-sweep, while Hope was cleaned by Mohammed Siraj on a ball that stayed a bit low.
However, the Windies frustrated the hosts further with captain Roston Chase making 40, while Justin Greaves (50) and Jayden Seales (32) put up a 79-run stand for the 10th wicket to hand India a 121-run target.
