West Indies lost in fantasy-land
Colin E. Croft reviews the second cricket test match between West Indies and South Africa
Stabroek News
December 31, 2003
There are times that I wonder if I exist in a cricket fantasyland, since I may be the only one seeing the reality of West Indies cricket as it stands. Certainly, the West Indies cricket team captain, Brian Lara, seems to exist elsewhere. Despite all of the respect that he has around the world, I would, after the debacle that became the second Test match against South Africa, like to ask Brian how he suggests that the West Indies would be able to win a Test match on this present tour? I am quite sure that the bowlers that he has at his disposal, any combination of them, could not bowl South Africa out twice, get 20 wickets, in a Test match on this tour. It is as simple as that.
The second Test toss might have been a good one to win, since the pitch may have had some life in the first hour or so of the game. However, the first innings wickets of West Indians Wavell Hinds, allowing the ball to hit his unprotected bat as he padded up to Shaun Pollock, or Ramnaresh Sarwan playing so wide outside his off stump that he may have played at a wide, or Shiv Chanderpaul also being so square as he played that he could not control the delivery, had nothing to do with the pitch. Their early dismissals, though, had a lot to do with the game itself and its result. At least, Chanderpaul and Sarwan made slight amends in the second innings, each batting well, with purpose, to each make another Test century. Overall, the pitch was a batsman's dream.
Day Three of the second Test match was one of the worst days of international cricket that I have ever seen in my life, and I have been either seeing international cricket since 1965, or playing it myself since 1977, or covering it as Sports Journalist since 1993, more than 100 Test matches overall.
None of the West Indies bowlers seemed capable of as simple a task as delivering four, not six, as one over consists of, and one expects, but four deliveries along the same `line' of the stumps; the `offside'. Merve Dillon, Vasbert Drakes, Fidel Edwards and worst of all, Adam Sanford, could not sometimes hit another set of stumps if they had been in place!! For international Test cricketers, they were as poor as could be imagined. This type of bowling could not get any international team out twice, much less one that is so full of tremendous batsmen and a team that is so full of purpose.
In addition to this inept bowling display, the tourists also managed to drop no less than six catches in the South African innings of over 650 runs. It was a really putrid example of international cricket. Herschell Gibbs, Jacques Kallis and Gary Kirsten, especially the latter, batted magnificently, and in my mind, Kirsten should have been given the `Man of the Match' reward, but no team which benefits from so many dropped catches and mishaps in the field of play should do anything but crush the hapless opposition which allows such possibilities. The West Indies as a team was truly shameful on Day 3 and was on to a hiding with a deficit of nearly 400 runs on first innings. The display by the West Indies cricket team on Day 3, Test 2 would, to paraphrase a great American President, `go down in history as being as poor as is possible!!'
Lara suggests that the West Indies would not be `whitewashed' (4-0) in this series as they were in 1998; 5-0. He may be correct in that, since the West Indies might manage to at least draw a game. For them to do that, it would mean that the batsmen of the team would have to bat for their lives just to save a game. These West Indies bowlers could not get 20 wickets to win a Test match if their lives depended on it.
Brian Lara has serious problems with the make-up of his bowling attack, despite what he might fantasize on. The new year could be good for him personally, as a batsman, but collectively, there are two very difficult Tests matches to go. Only batting can save the West Indies from a `whitewash'.