The Hindu : Sport / Cricket : Lara holds a unique place

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Wednesday, Apr 14, 2004

Sport

Sport - Cricket

Lara holds a unique place

By Ted Corbett

ST. JOHN'S, APRIL 13. Brian Lara's world record score of 400 not out is set to make him one of the richest cricketers; notwithstanding the fact that he is already a wealthy man, with a Trinidad home close to the Test ground at Queen's Park Oval and overlooking the Savannah in the capital Port of Spain. He will soon be offered a contract by an Indian bat maker that will be worth half a million pounds sterling and set him alongside Sachin Tendulkar and Steve Waugh in the cricket money stakes. And why not? He holds a unique place in the game as the man who twice on the same ground created a world record and he is also the only man to regain the record.

Lara's quadruple century, out of 751 for five, invites a bat-maker to create The 400 Bat and sell it around the world. He told me recently that Indian bats are the best and that he was quite ready to use one straight out of the plastic wrapper in a Test match.

Whatever bat he was using for his 777-minute innings in the fourth and final Test against England hardly matters now since it simply proved that he is the greatest batsman in the world at this moment. But when the advertisers, the money men and the commercial experts get hold of the idea and turn it into gold ,Lara will have enough money to go comfortably to retirement whenever he pleases. Or to continue as captain as long as he wishes.

His long innings of 582 balls with 43 fours and four sixes was a flawed effort compared with his 375 on this ground in 1994 when he was a 24-year-old still not established as one of the game's elite. He might have been caught twice, he was almost run out and at times, especially when the landmarks of his innings came round, he looked tired and nervous. But he was ebullient afterwards when he described his emotions in simple sportsman's terms: "I am glad I have my appetite for the game again and I am happy that I made these runs when I was playing well."

Lara and Ridley Jacobs, the sort of stout fellow you would want to be your companion on the final trudge to the top of a mountain, put on a record 282 for the sixth wicket as West Indies scored its second highest total and the highest recorded against England.

Unselfishly, Jacobs concentrated on giving Lara the strike when he needed runs and keeping him at the other end when England, which was again without Matthew Hoggard and eventually Simon Jones, unleashed their barrage of short balls in an all-out attack that was as near Bodyline as the modern laws allow. They put up an impressive performance in the field; you could count the sloppy bits of fielding on the fingers of one hand and the bowlers stuck to their task heroically on a pitch none of them wanted to take anywhere save the rubbish heap.

Lara played all the shots in his book but his greatest were the six and the four that took him past Matthew Hayden who has, in my opinion, held the record on loan for the past few months because he took it off the Zimbabwe attack.

Lara was facing four professional quick bowlers and a decent off-spinner; in his first record score he faced Angus Fraser, Andrew Caddick, Phil Tufnell and Chris Lewis all of whom took more than 90 Test wickets and had long careers at the top.

So the record is back where it belongs and now that Lara has crossed the 400 threshold, others will be able to follow much as Roger Bannister beating four minutes for the mile allowed the rest to overtake him. His feat in regaining the crown is much like Mohammad Ali retaking the heavyweight title or Lance Armstrong snatching the Tour de France again after his battle with cancer.

His accomplishment was put in context by England which lost its first four wickets for 98 which allowed those of us who have not seen him to watch their new wicket-keeper Geraint Jones batting. He had an impressive two days behind the stumps and tonight he looked the part in front. As for the West Indies attack it has an exuberance about them which bodes well for the future which was set in train today by the man laying claim to a place among their top five players of all time even though he is competing with Gary Sobers, Viv Richards, Michael Holding, Malcolm Marshall and too many other fast bowlers to count, as well as Des Haynes, Gordon Greenidge, Everton Weekes and Clive Lloyd.

Surely that tradition of talent, now vested in Lara alone, cannot fail these cricket-mad islands much longer.

* * *

Flintoff battles on

St. John's April 13. England was 231 for eight in its first innings at lunch on the fourth day of the fourth Test against West Indies here on Tuesday. Andrew Flintoff with 68 and Simon Jones with 1 were at the crease.

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