Starc’s incredible performance propelled Australia to a 176-run victory and a 3-0 series margin after they had set West Indies 204 for victory in another match dominated by the quick bowlers. Alzarri Joseph,  with a career-best 5 for 27, and Shamar shared nine wickets as Australia’s last four wickets fell for 22 runs but that was nothing compared to what followed.

Starc produced one of the great opening overs. He removed John Campbell first ball, the fourth time in his career he had struck with the opening delivery of an innings, when the left-handed edged a perfect outswinger to substitute wicketkeeper Josh Inglis who was standing in for the concussed Alex Carey.

Four balls later, Kevlon Anderson shouldered arms as the ball swung back to strike his shin in front of middle stump yet he reviewed the plumbest of lbws. Next delivery, another one arched back between Brandon King’s bat and pad to demolish the stumps. It was the sixth time in Test history a team had been 0 for 3.

Mikyle Louis survived the hat-trick ball at the start of Starc’s second over, but fittingly his 400th wicket came with another trademark inswinger as he trapped Louis lbw becoming the fourth Australian bowler to the landmark after Shane Warne, Glenn McGrath and Nathan Lyon.

The extraordinary scenes continued when, two balls later, he added Shai Hope lbw to bring up a five-wicket haul in just 15 deliveries, the fastest from the start of an innings – beating the previous record of jointly held by Ernie Toshack, Stuart Broad and Scott Boland by four deliveries.

Starc’s monopoly ended when Josh Hazlewood had Roston Chase caught behind to leave West Indies on a scarcely believable 11 for 6. In the eighth over, Greaves became the first batter into double figures as he and Alzarri managed to reach the tea interval which at one stage had been in doubt.

After the interval, Boland got into the act as Greaves edged to slip and Shamar was lbw via the DRS. Then, with the hat-trick delivery, he speared one through Warrican. Few would have bet against four-in-four, but Starc ended with the honour of wrapping up one of the wildest passages of play imaginable.

The ball had dominated from the very start of the day when Cameron Green shouldered arms to one from Shamar, which shaped back to cannon into off stump. Green had played superbly the previous evening to given Australia a cushion for the fourth innings, although in the end they didn’t come close to needing it.

Shamar took his series tally to 22 wickets at 14.95, the most for a West Indies bowler against Australia since Courtney Walsh in 1999, but not long later there was only one quick bowler being talked about.

Brief scores:
Australia 225 in 70.3 overs (Steven Smith 48, Cameron Green 46;  Shamar Joseph 4-33, Justin Greaves 3-56, Jayden Seales 3-59) and121 in 37 overs  (Cameron Green 42;  Alzarri Joseph 5-27, Shamar Joseph 4-34) beat West Indies 143 in 52.1 overs  (John Campbell 36; Scott Boland 3-34) and 27 in 14.3 overs  (Justin Greaves 11; Mitchell Starc 6-9, Scott Boland 3-2) by 176 runs

[Cricinfo]