April 18, 2004

An offended Lara, has reclaimed the title that many believe is now very much his to keep ... again!

Six months ago Brian Lara was woken from deep slumber. It was 3 in the middle of the night and the news wasn’t good. Australia’s frontline assault specialist, Matthew Hayden, had just broken his record for the highest individual score in a Test innings. At that moment, as Lara remembered later, he lay in bed thinking. It were those previous moments in solitude that gave him the impetus to achieve greater things.

It was an ominous thought, akin to MacArthur’s famous quip: “I shall return”, after being forced out of the Philippines by the Japanese in 1942.

When West Indies as a team continued to hit the pits in South Africa and the first three Tests in their latest rubber against England, the entire Caribbean knew that yet again it would take another Lara vaudeville show to lift the game. But nobody, not even the most ardent Lara fans, could not have imagined such a lift off.

Lara had warned before the series: “I am mentally stronger, far more mature and less of a flash in the pan, which is what some people thought then.” His Test form over the last 12 months leading up to this series — he scored 1595 runs at an average of 69.35 — seemed to promise an encore for the season. He had added: “I am looking forward to surpassing what I did ten years ago — not perhaps in terms of runs, but in terms of worth.”

Now, ten years to the week when he himself went past countryman Sir Gary Sobers’ 365, he did surpass himself and Hayden in terms of runs as well. The poor Australian can reflect that he held the record for only six months, but can take solace from the fact that England’s Andy Sandham held it for only three months before Bradman went past his 325 with 334 in 1930.

And despite the series and Frank Worrel Trophy already packed for England, its worth is priceless. Like Mark Twain, he signalled to all that the rumours of his death had been greatly exaggerated.

He had been crucified through the last three Tests and had scored 100 runs in his last six Test innings in this rubber. But the epic was salvation not just for himself but for West Indies cricket; it blockaded the dreaded whitewash from a side that has been made to look far better than it is. And it seemed to inspire people like Sarwan and Jacobs and the bowlers to put their hand up and be counted. It may well have saved his captaincy, though some are claiming that his batting has nothing to do with his inability to gel and discipline his bowlers and batsmen.

Before this Test he had contemplated resigning from the captaincy as he had done four years ago when he was in tears after whitewashes in South Africa and New Zealand. It may well have quietened the baying crowd of critics. He has been seen something of a villain since leading a quiet rebellion against Carl Hooper who had steadied the team till last year but in the same series, inspired West Indies to a world record chase of 413 against the Australians in the last Test.

He certainly is the master of the end game, having fetched 182 in the fourth Test against Australia a few years ago amid another whitewash and no other worthwhile score.

Even if the knives are still out for his axing from the leadership role, it has certainly silenced the Balmy Army and growing English feeling of superiority and the calypso spectator seldom asks for more. One of among the Englishmen will be least amused and that is Graham Thorpe, the torch bearer of English cricket arrogance. He is the only member of the current side who chased around Antigua’s Recreation Park, the name an irony in itself, when Lara caned England to reach 375 in 1994. For the Englishman it was a 13 hour deja vu, as indeed it was for Darrel Hair, who also was umpiring in that Test ten years back.

Lara then was an exuberant young man of 24, a free flowing artisan with not much care for homework. On that fateful day, resuming at 320, he warmed up by playing golf. But just how responsible Lara has become can be seen that on the Tuesday he got into his groove by knocking up on the ground. Whereas he had the cheek to come down the pitch to equal Hayden’s score with a huge six, he also accumulated 139 singles to add to 172 runs in boundaries.

Lara this time was fighting for pride and rejuvenation of West Indian cricket. In 1994 the rubber had been won and the last Test was a celebration; this time his captaincy and reputation depended on it.

He appears a sensitive soul, light in frame and small and vulnerable. Yet he has displayed a mental strength that few cricketers can boast of. It should not be overlooked that he batted for some 200 overs in sweltering heat. That takes a high plane of physical fitness

He has lived among the ruins for most of his career as his establishment in the side came in the wake of some stupefying West Indian collapses especially in the World Cups of 1992 and 1996. West Indies, over the past five years have had a pathetic record and Lara has so often been the boy standing on the burning deck as the ship has sunk.

But he has retained his tensile strength all through those times and in his increasing years. Scoring 400 appears the stuff of youth. Yet Lara has achieved it with a young man’s stamina and boyhood excitement. There have been only 17 batsmen in the history of the game who have made Test match triple centuries and only Andrew Sandham, Graham Gooch and Mark Taylor were older than Lara when they crossed 300, then also for the first time.

He has joined Bradman as the only man to have gone past 300 twice in Test Cricket and now the only one to have reached 400. Interestingly both have done so on the same ground; Bradman at Headingley in 1930 and 1934. Lara at St. John’s in 1994 and 2004.

In the process he spoilt Michael Vaughan’s triumphant march through the Caribbean by helping post the highest team score against England in 820 matches. But he did do him one favour. He won the toss and chose to bat; the English captain had planned to put in West Indies if England had won the toss.

The significance of this monumental progression to Test cricket first quadruple century after 127 years extends beyond this Test match and the rubber. Lara has forever been compared to Sachin Tendulkar and debate has raged as to who is the heir to Bradman’s crown. Sir Don himself has likened Sachin to himself and felt he saw himself in the Indian’s batting.

But it has been Brian Lara who has compiled tall scores with a Bradmanesque appetite. After 14 years Tendulkar has only two double hundreds, the second of which came earlier this year. Lara has now a quadruple and a triple (both world records at their inception) and seven double hundreds. In fact his first Test century in Australia in 1992-93 touched 277, the fourth highest by any West Indian and the highest among the two countries.

Sachin, it seems, will forever carry the stigma that he is not a match winner in the truest sense of the word in that he has seldom lifted his side like phoenix from the ashes. Lara has led some heroic fight backs from lost causes, not least of them the unforgettable 153 not out in 1998-99 as he led the tail to complete a one wicket win against the Australians.

He has been an enigma in that he is obviously naturally gifted with a cricketing eye and grace and when on song, makes runs throughout and often carries the team scores on his back. He single-handedly defied the 1998-99 Australian tourists with 213, 8, 153 not out and 100 in the four Tests and in Sri Lanka in 2001-02, piled up 221 and 130 in one Test and 688 runs — a record 42 per cent of West Indies’ output — in the series.

But he is aware that he has lacked the consistency of Sachin which is where the Indian little master may come closer to The Don than Lara. And he is big enough to admit that when he says: “I would like to be a lot more consistent. I would like to be a (Sachin) Tendulkar, or someone like that, someone who could go out in the middle and keep scoring; if he doesn’t get a hundred, he gets at least 30 or 40, and scores like that. You know, it would be great to be that sort of individual. As a top-flight player, you want to be considered not only as someone who could spoon out great performances, but someone who has been consistent over the years.” Is he the greatest record breaker in cricket history? It certainly seems so when we see that in the last eleven years he has set records one after the other. His 277 is the highest score for a man scoring his first Test hundred. In 1994 he recorded the then highest Test score of 375. In 1994 he became the first player to score seven centuries in eight first class innings and in the same year he recorded the highest first class score ever with an unbeaten 501.

Add to that the fact that he was the quickest to 9000 Test runs and the scorer of the second fastest ODI hundred and he certainly is someone special.

For those who feel he may well have reached the epitome of all that he can conquer there is the interesting, perhaps amusing news, that Bangladesh are coming to play two Tests against him after this series.

Please Visit our Sponsor (Ads open in separate window)