Revisiting the last couple of years of West Indian cricket

TIno Best

With the base being laid, the India tour proved fruitful. Resisting the Indian team cut out to dominate their opposition in dry, turning tracks has proved to be difficult for the best of teams. The decisive factor in the three otherwise evenly contested Tests was a collapse in batting at critical junctures; they were bowled out for 180 in the second innings in Delhi only to squander a 95-run first-innings lead, and for 153 in Kolkata in the first innings that cost them the game despite a determined resistance later.

Their fortitude almost bore fruit in Mumbai, where another batting collapse allowed both teams to anticipate victory. Eventually, neither team won, as the scores were level at the end of the scheduled time for the game, with India nine wickets down in the chase.

Darren Bravo, the young capable middle-order batsman, was their main contributor with the bat. He scored two centuries, one with an experienced Shivnarine Chanderpaul for company. This would prove to be a valuable pairing.

In April next year the two continued their productivity as Australia found it difficult to get the upper hand over their opposition. Chanderpaul, this time, outperformed everyone else by scoring 346 runs at 86.50, but it wasn’t enough to prevent the odd batting collapse which proved to be the difference between the two sides.

West Indies had held an upper hand in the first Test in Barbados with a solid batting performance in the first innings. But with some persistent bowling by Australia late into the fourth day, they were bowled out for 148. It proved decisive in the end as Australia only scraped through to a three-wicket victory.

The margin of defeat in the second and series-clinching win in Dominica was also not too big. When Chanderpaul and Bravo stood firm against the Australian bowlers putting together a solid partnership in the latter half of the fourth day, the stiff target of 370 seemed a realistic possibility. But an effort ball from Shane Watson surprised Bravo, who had been unruffled till then, to take his outside edge which brought the curtains down on the chase, falling short by 76 runs.

The difference in the attitude shift of West Indies and in the skill-sets of both teams was acknowledged by the former West Indian great Michael Holding.

The one takeaway for them was that they had been able to get themselves into winning positions in both the losses. One big catalyst for this was their new-ball bowler Kemar Roach. Moderately built in terms of height and physique for a fast bowler, Roach has the ability to move the ball both ways, use the landing crease to his advantage and bowl with a lot of pace. He accounted for 19 Australian wickets in the series.

But will Roach and the other seamers, who have so far had the option of falling back on the main spinner, rise up to the demands of cold and windy England?

They won’t. The superiority of the English in their conditions was hard to resist. Roach was the most productive bowler for the visitors with eight wickets, but he was far less prolific than seamers Stuart Broad and Tim Bresnan, who took 26 wickets between them.

A 155-run first-innings lead in the opening Test at Lord’s put paid to their hopes of saving the game, but a new ingredient in the rejuvenated West Indies team – fight and application – was on display when the home team had been set 191 to win.

A failure in batting again led to a comprehensive defeat in the second Test. But before the end of the tough series, some joy was found from an unlikely source. Tino Best, with his enthusiastic demeanour on the field, played the innings of his life to score a record 95 runs, the highest score by a No.11 in Tests.

There was a negative undercurrent, though, in his batting partner Denesh Ramdin’s written message, seen on a piece of paper revealed at the time of ‘celebration’ of his century, ‘Yeh Viv, talk nah’. It was an attack on Viv Richards for his perceived observations on the wicket-keeper.