LONDON, England (Reuters) - Over a decade studded by a triple Test century at one end and an unprecedented quadruple at the other, West Indies captain Brian Lara has shone with a flawed brilliance.
Lara, 400 not out, finally called a halt yesterday on the third day of the final Test against England in St John's, Antigua, after an innings which saved his team from the ignominy of a series whitewash.
Only Don Bradman had scored two Test 300s before being surpassed by Lara and even the incomparable Australian never matched the elan and style of the 34-year-old Trinidadian.
Yet in the Caribbean Lara provokes a variety of emotions, with admiration of his transcendent skills countered by accusations that he carries at least some of the responsibility for the steady decline in West Indies' cricket.
Lara, born on May 2, 1969, in a village near Port of Spain, announced his presence on the world stage with 277 in the fifth Test against Australia in Sydney in January, 1993.
The compact left-hander with the exaggerated backlift had long been marked as a batsman with rare gifts, but staggering as it seems in retrospect, he was forced to fight for a place in the sun.
He toured England in 1991 but was unable to win a place in the team until Viv Richards, Gordon Greenidge and Jeffrey Dujon departed the international scene after the drawn series.
Lara's Sydney innings revived his team's fortunes and confirmed he was a worthy successor to the glittering line of great West Indies batsmen starting with George Headley, ‘the black Bradman’, in the 1930s.
His performances in the following year elevated him into another realm.
RECORD GALORE
In a chanceless display spread over two days, Lara scored 375 in the fifth Test against England in Antigua, adding 10 runs to the mark set by Barbadian Garfield Sobers 36 years earlier.
Sobers, fresh from the celebrations to mark the 40th anniversary of his Test debut, was on hand to embrace his successor as world record holder.
More was to follow. Lara scored six centuries in seven innings for Warwickshire in the county championship, culminating in a world record 501 against Durham. Acclaim accompanied his every move during the English summer.
Sobers, by common consent, was the finest all-rounder in history and, along with Bradman, one of the Wisden almanack's five cricketers of the 20th century.
Despite playing cricket all year round, he made little money from the game, retiring just a few seasons before wages for international players increased dramatically.
But he was also not subject to the unrelenting gaze of the media in an age obsessed by the cult of the celebrity.
Another Barbadian, the respected cricket commentator Tony Cozier, interposed a prescient paragraph in his portrait of Lara for the 1994 Wisden.
Lara's achievements over the past 12 months, Cozier wrote, placed on him ``an awesome responsibility that not all celebrated young sportsmen can properly handle.
``With satellite television now spanning the globe, Lara has truly become cricket's first truly international megastar. Public expectations will be excessive and the non-cricketing demands on him persistent.''
A year later, Cozier's warning was sadly vindicated. Lara briefly withdrew from the team during their tour of England after a dressing room row. He then pulled out of the following visit to Australia two days before the team were due to leave.
CARIBBEAN DECLINE
Lara was a dissident voice at the 1996 World Cup and, after succeeding the dignified Richie Richardson as West Indies' captain, was sacked then reinstated during a players' strike before the 1998 tour of South Africa.
After two unforgettable innings (213 and 153 not out) which ensured a drawn 1999 series against Australia in the Caribbean, Lara resigned as captain in 2000 and took a break from the game. He was reappointed last year but, despite his heroics in Antigua, his future as skipper must be in doubt.
During Lara's international career, West Indies have plummeted from an unofficial first to an official eighth in the world rankings, ahead of only Zimbabwe and Bangladesh.
Richardson is one of his many critics.
``A lot of people, including I believe some senior players, are saying that his captaincy, which seems uninspiring and at times incomprehensible, is part of the problem,'' he said recently.
According to Cozier, Lara's decision to drop himself down the order in the third Test in Barbados ``was a shameful shirking of responsibility.''
Separating Lara the batsman from Lara the leader makes an objective assessment easier.
After openly questioning his commitment to the game that has brought him both fulfilment and frustration, Lara has scored consistently and heavily for a losing side.
His innings on the small St John's ground was a reprise of a wonderful career, featuring the full flow of his cover driving, the wristy flicks to fine leg and the swift footwork to the spinners.
After being successfully targeted by the England fast bowlers in the current series, he re-emerged in Antigua as the world number one in an age featuring five batsmen in the all-time top 20 by average.