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| December 01, 2006 | Friday | Ziqa'ad 9, 1427 |
Record-breaking Yousuf hogs limelight as Windies fight to save Test
KARACHI, Nov 30: Brilliant Mohammad Yousuf rewrote cricket history on Thursday when he broke one of the longest-standing batting records as Pakistan moved closer to winning the third and final Test against the West Indies at the National Stadium.
Yousuf surged past legendary West Indian Sir Viv Richards’s 30-year-old world record aggregate in a calendar year of 1710 runs with a brilliant but chancy 124 — his ninth century in 2006 — to complete a fantastic year with an incredible 1788 runs in 11 Tests at an astounding average of 99.33.
Soon after Pakistan declared their second innings at 399 for six, the West Indies, who have been set an improbable target of 444 to level the series, lost openers Chris Gayle and Daren Ganga within four overs at the start of the second innings.
The West Indies’ hopes of escaping defeat now lay on the shoulders of their captain Brian Lara as the tourists reached stumps on day four at 39 for two when bad light stopped play with 10 overs remaining.
Lara (18) and Ramnaresh Sarwan (11) will resume Friday’s final day of the series in a bid to prevent Pakistan from winning the series 2-0 here after the hosts won the first Test in Lahore by nine wickets while drawing the second in Multan.
The fourth day of the final Test began with all eyes focussed on just one man. It was a matter of time before Yousuf achieved the much-awaited landmark. Having scored 102 in the first innings, the 32-year-old right-hander needed a further 46 at the start of play and he achieved it comfortably.
No matter what transpired at the other end, Yousuf held the centre stage. Not even a chanceless century by opener Mohammad Hafeez, who converted his overnight score of 57 into a career-best 104, or Inzamam-ul-Haq’s first significant score of the series could snatch away the limelight from Yousuf.
Yousuf, who resumed his innings at 1 not out this morning, relentlessly marched on towards the elusive goal. The hapless West Indians tried every possible trick in the book to ensure that Richards’ landmark remained intact but in vain.
Lara, in his pre-match media conference, had expressed his desire in emphatic words that West Indies won’t let Yousuf get to the record. But like his team-mates, he could do little to stop the run-machine from breaking the hearts of all West Indians.
The defining moment arrived after 99 minutes of play when Corey Collymore, who had not conceded a single boundary in his previous 12 overs, was sweetly hit wide of mid-on for a four that enabled Yousuf to ease past the great Richards and into the record books.
Just before achieving the landmark, Yousuf had reached another significant milestone at personal score of 43 when he went past Zaheer Abbas’s Pakistan record of most runs in a three-Test series (583 against India in 1978-79).
Not for the first time on this tour, the West Indians were overgenerous as they allowed one chance to Hafeez and two to Yousuf, who then set about making sure they paid heavily for their lapses in the field.
Hafeez, who was on 85 when Pakistan came off at lunch at 241 for two, drove Jerome Taylor past mid-on for his 10th boundary to complete a fine hundred. However, he failed to cash in when Dwayne Bravo put him down off Daren Powell.
The right-handed opener, whose other century was 102 against Bangladesh at Peshawar in 2003-04, was caught behind off Taylor for a 266-ball 104 that spanned nearly seven hours. His third-wicket partnership with the incomparable Yousuf was worth 149 in 195 minutes off 262 balls.
Inzamam, after nine relative failures (166 runs) since the Lord’s Tests in July, received a warm welcome from a turnout which gradually swelled as Yousuf continued his mission albeit with luck on his side.
Gayle was the culprit when Sarwan, the part-time leg-spinner, forced Yousuf, then on 68, to pull high towards midwicket fence but the fielder dropped a sitter. Then on 87, Taylor let off Yousuf when he failed to hold a sharp return catch.
Apart from those lapses there was no one else to deny Yousuf establishing one record after another. His fourth century of the series arrived via a fine drive to the midwicket fence off Powell.
Yousuf, who in the first innings had gone past the record of most hundreds in a calendar year which also stood in the names of Richards (in 1976) and Aravinda de Silva (1997), now became only the sixth Pakistani to score a century in each innings of the same Test.
The others who had achieved the feat before him include Hanif Mohammad ( 111 & 104 v England at Dhaka, 1961-62), Javed Miandad ( 104 & 103 not out v New Zealand at Hyderabad, 1984-85), Wajahatullah Wasti ( 133 & 121 v Sri Lanka at Lahore, 1998-99), Yasir Hameed (170 & 105 on debut v Bangladesh at Karachi, 2003-04) and Inzamam-ul-Haq (109 & 100 not out v England at Faisalabad, 2005-06).
Yousuf, who was 113 at tea which was taken with Pakistan already impregnably placed on 339 for three, finished his last innings of the year in an inauspicious manner when he was bowled round his legs while trying to sweep Sarwan.
His 124 (294 minutes, 195 balls, 15 fours) extended his series aggregate to 665, the third highest for a series of this magnitude (three Tests), while latest century was his seventh in eight Tests against the West Indies and his sixth in five Tests which bettered Sir Donald Bradman’s six in six.
The onus was now on Inzamam to give West Indies some respite by closing the innings as soon as Yousuf departed. But the skipper seemed more interested in resurrecting his immediate future than worrying about putting team interest first.
Inzamam celebrated his fifty in such a manner which to the onlookers suggested as if he had completed a double century or reached a rare milestone and only time will tell if the extended batting stint was really a wise move. However, it was good to see the skipper back among the runs. He scored 58 (91 balls, three fours and one six) before finally declaring the innings.
A lethal-looking Umar Gul then proceeded to clean bowl Gayle for two and Shahid Nazir forced Ganga to shuffle across the stumps for a leg-before dismissal as Pakistan tightened the noose on Lara’s men.
Scoreboard
PAKISTAN (1st Innings) 304 (Mohammad Yousuf 102).
WEST INDIES (1st Innings) 260 (D. Ganga 81, D. Ramdin 50; Umar Gul 4-79).
PAKISTAN (2nd Innings, overnight 130-2):
Mohammad Hafeez c Ramdin b Taylor 104
Imran Farhat c Ramdin b Powell 20
Younis Khan lbw b Gayle 38
Mohammad Yousuf b Sarwan 124
Inzamam-ul-Haq not out 58
Shoaib Malik b Collymore 10
Abdul Razzaq c Gayle b Sarwan 10
EXTRAS (B-13, LB-21, W-1) 35
TOTAL (for six wkts decl, 123.5 overs) 399
FALL OF WKTS: 1-43, 2-122, 3-271, 4-365, 5-384, 6-399.
BOWLING: Taylor 24-8-60-1; Collymore 22-10-52-1; Powell 24-6-70-1; Bravo 19-1-68-0; Gayle 15-2-38-1; Sarwan 17.5-0-70-2; Chanderpaul 2-0-7-0 (1w).
WEST INDIES (2nd Innings):
C.H. Gayle b Umar Gul 2
D. Ganga lbw b Shahid 2
B.C. Lara not out 18
R.R. Sarwan not out 11
EXTRAS (B-4, LB-1, NB-1) 6
TOTAL (for two wkts, 9.2 overs) 39
FALL OF WKTS: 1-2, 2-17.
BOWLING (to-date): Umar Gul 5-0-25-1 (1nb); Shahid Nazir 4.2-2-9-1.
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