BRIAN LARA has immediately begun answering some of the questions increasingly placed against his name prior to the current tour of Sri Lanka. He himself seemed unsure as to whether his dodgy right hamstring muscle was ready to take it on.

Others, influentially placed, openly wondered whether he still had the motivation necessary to score consistently at the highest level.

Sir Everton Weekes, who did so with such effect he averaged 58.5 during his glittering career, worried that he was past his best.

Bob Simpson, the former Australian captain, predictably stirred up a hornet's (Jack Spaniard's) nest with an opinion that he didn't merit the classification of great.

Lara has responded to each in word and deed and yesterday was elevated three places on the PriceWaterhouseCooper monthly Test ratings from No.6 to No.3, only behind the prolific, but underrated Zimbabwean left-hander Andy Flower and the Indian star Sachin Tendulkar.

His comments even before the series started here have proved prophetic.

On the hamstring that has bothered him, on and off, since June 2000 on the tour of England: "I feel very good. My injury's still there unfortunately but it's an injury to can play with."

"I'm able to go down the wicket and use my feet and that's important. It's improving a bit."

On whether he still has the motivation: "I'm always hungry (for runs). It may not look so to other people but I always want to score runs. Hopefully, this series is going to be something special for me."

On whether he's past his best: "I'd love to average above 50 in Test cricket instead of lingering on 47. Hopefully I can get it back up there and put it back up there to the top and be up there among the big guys in world cricket."

As with every one who ever played the game, greatness can only be properly judged when Lara eventually takes his leave to enjoy his retirement in his mansion on the hill at Lady Chancellor Drive overlooking Port-of-Spain.

It is yet too little, too soon even to assess whether this is, indeed, the second coming in the life of Brian but the evidence of the two Tests here is encouraging.

His hamstring has given him no more problems that the occasional pain-killer can't take care of. He has spent an accumulated thirteen and a half hours accumulating 337 runs in his four innings and has fought some of the most difficult and enthralling battles of his life in the middle against Muttiah Muralitheran, a unique and remarkable off-spin bowler.

He has been noticeably relaxed and communicative off the field, committed and focused at practice and in the middle.

At the age of 32, he might, just might, have suddenly rekindled the spark that brought him those incredible record scores of 375 and 501 not out and, on every conceivable count, made him a batsman to rank alongside anyone the game has known.

Maturity is not an adjective readily applied to his cricket of late. Impetuosity, spontaneity and moodiness have been more apt as he has allowed his average to nosedive as many as a dozen points in four years.

The incomparable brilliance of his match-winning 213 and unbeaten 153 in back-to-back Tests against Australia in 1999, when he personally and the West Indies team he then led were at their lowest ebb, have been too often compromised by mediocrity unbecoming of his god-given talent.

He was so troubled by inconsistency he gave up the captaincy, took a break from the game, considered retiring and sought psychological help.

Captain Carl Hooper has passed through similar times of self-doubt himself before entering the present, second phase of his career. He is well placed to read the signs.

"There's been a lot of talk about Brian being past his best but he's shown people he's still one of the best players in the world and this is a big plus for the West Indies," he said. "He's worked hard, he's been dedicated and he's had the results on this tour."

Hooper also dismissed the view that Lara is a negative influence in the team.

Instead, he said, he had "always been helpful and supportive of younger players and West Indies cricket in general".

"We can all look at Brian and take a leaf out of his book," he added.

Coach Roger Harper has commented on the distinct change in Lara's approach to batting.

"It has been so good here, not because he has been as flambouyant as in some of those innings in the past where he's made big scores playing that way, but because he's been much more compact," he explained.

"In a way, he's accumulating runs rather than playing great innings," he added. "If he approaches batting that way, no doubt about it, he'll be piling the runs on."

And that, again and at last, seems Brian Lara's primary goal in life. Ends.