DUBLIN, Ire­land – Sunil Am­bris scored his maid­en One Day In­ter­na­tion­al (ODI) cen­tu­ry, be­com­ing the first Vin­cent­ian to do so for the West In­dies, to help pro­pel the re­gion­al team to their high­est ever suc­cess­ful run chase in ODIs as they claimed vic­to­ry over Ire­land in the Tri-Na­tion Se­ries yes­ter­day.

Am­bris cracked 148 from just 136 balls as the vis­i­tors over­hauled Ire­land’s chal­leng­ing to­tal of 327 for five from their 50 overs, to end on 331 for five off 47.5 overs.

The West In­dies’ pre­vi­ous suc­cess­ful high­est run chase in ODIs was 309 against Pak­istan in 2017.

His per­for­mance over­shad­owed that of Ire­land’s Andy Bal­birine, who al­so scored a fight­ing cen­tu­ry af­ter the home side won the toss and opt­ed to bat first.

Co­in­ci­den­tal­ly, Am­bris who was not named in the Windies’ 15-mem­ber squad for the up­com­ing ICC World Cup, was on­ly pro­mot­ed to open the bat­ting af­ter John Camp­bell’s sore back ruled him out.

Am­bris to­geth­er with the in-form Shai Hope, who was chas­ing a third suc­ces­sive cen­tu­ry, put on 84 runs for the first wick­et in quick time.

And when Hope lost his wick­et to William Rankin to be out for 30, fol­lowed soon af­ter by Dar­ren Bra­vo for just 17, Am­bris and Ros­ton Chase’s 128-run stand off 116 balls cre­at­ed the per­fect launch­ing pad for the Windies.

The short­er and small­er Am­bris was the main ag­gres­sor dur­ing this stand, while Chase cus­tom­ar­i­ly worked the ball through the gaps and was con­tent to ro­tate the strike.

They both looked un­both­ered by Ire­land’s most­ly medi­um pace at­tack, but four runs away from a de­served half-cen­tu­ry Chase was bowled by left-arm pac­er Josh Lit­tle.

Am­bris’ 169-minute stay at the crease came to an end soon af­ter too, be­com­ing Rankin’s third vic­tim, as the Windies slipped to 252 for four in the 40th over.

But cap­tain Ja­son Hold­er who smashed 36 from 24 balls and fel­low Bar­ba­di­an Jonathan Carter who fin­ished un­beat­en on 43 from 27 balls, put on 75 runs at over ten runs an over to take West In­dies with­in touch­ing dis­tance of their tar­get.

How­ev­er, with the scores locked, Hold­er need­less­ly gave his wick­et away, leav­ing Carter to fin­ish it off in fine style with a bound­ary.

Rankin was Ire­land’s top bowler end­ing with fig­ures of 3-65 from his 7.5 overs.

Ear­li­er, Bal­birnie had giv­en the home side a fight­ing chance of win­ning their first match of the se­ries cour­tesy of a spec­tac­u­lar knock.

The 28-year-old scored 135 from 124 balls and shared in two ma­jor part­ner­ships to help Ire­land reach their high­est to­tal of the tour­na­ment so far.

Fol­low­ing the loss of James Mc­Col­lum’s wick­et ear­ly on with the score on 19, he and Paul Stir­ling added 146 runs in a sec­ond-wick­et part­ner­ship to seize con­trol of the con­test.

And even when Stir­ling was even­tu­al­ly out for a well-played 77 from 98 balls, Bal­birnie found an­oth­er wor­thy part­ner in Kevin O’Brien.

The two set about blast­ing 84 runs be­tween the 34th and 44th overs, which put Ire­land in po­si­tion to post a big to­tal.

Medi­um pac­er Jonathan Carter made the even­tu­al break­through, hav­ing Bal­birnie caught by skip­per Ja­son Hold­er. He faced 124 balls and struck four six­es and 11 bound­aries.

His dis­missal didn’t lead to a slow down in the scor­ing rate, with O’Brien and Mark Adair adding a fur­ther 42 runs in four overs.

Adair starred with a cameo un­beat­en 25 from 13 balls, strik­ing one huge six and two bound­aries, as Ire­land col­lect­ed 27 runs from the fi­nal two overs of the in­nings.

Shan­non Gabriel was the most suc­cess­ful West In­dies’ bowler, fin­ish­ing with two wick­ets for 47 runs.

(CMC)

SCORES

IRE­LAND 327 for five off 50 overs (Andy Bal­birnie 135, Paul Stir­ling 77, Kevin O’Brien 63; Shan­non Gabriel 2-47).

WEST IN­DIES 331 for five off 47.5 overs (Sunil Am­bris 148, Ros­ton Chase 46, Jonathan Carter 43 not out, Ja­son Hold­er 36, Shai Hope 30; William Rankin 3-65).