Brian Lara Back, But Not As captain..>

[Pete]

Bumble's been having his say over at Skysports.com

Originally Posted by David Lloyd

I don't know him personally, but I have not seen anything in Shivnarine Chanderpaul that says he is a leader. He looks to be a weak character, taping his fingers up and taking time out of the game for bizarre reasons.

Originally Posted by David Lloyd

Whilst it can't be doubted that Chanderpaul reacted well to his chance as skipper in Georgetown with a century and a good team performance, or that Lara has had his criticism as captain of the West Indies, my own belief is that Lara is a good captain. He has had some lousy attacks.

[Occasional Fan]

Originally Posted by Kirsty Harris

I seem to recall England being 5 or 6 wickets down at the end of the game - another hour bowling might have made all the difference. Unlikely, but not impossible by any means.

Definitely not impossible. England finished on 285 and 422-5 after WI had made 751-5dec in the first innings of the match. Point is that, to get there (or to get to Lara's 400), WI had batted on until after lunch on the third day, at least 30 minutes longer than they needed to. Add 10 minutes for an innings change which could have taken place over lunch and that's 40 minutes taken out of the England batting time; add another forty minutes for Brian Lara offering the draw early, and that's eighty minutes in total. And that, at the end of a series, and one that was already won anyway, is more than enough time to take five wickets. True, the scores were close enough that, had the declaration come earlier, WI might have had to bat again - maybe for 20 runs and with an extra half hour available on the last day if they needed it!

Loads of speculation, of course, but it still seems to me that Brian Lara, although not necessarily playing for personal glory, threw that match away. Series result could have been 3-1 rather than 3-0. If I were West Indian, I think I'd see that as a big difference.

[Kirsty Harris]

Originally Posted by Occasional Fan

Series result could have been 3-1 rather than 3-0. If I were West Indian, I think I'd see that as a big difference.

Totally agree - but many WI fans seem to have viewed the world record as being more significant than the win. A bit puzzlung to me, as I feel that a win in that game would have put them in a better state of mind, at the very least, for the return fixture in England. Instead, they turned up a defeated looking bunch who had no idea how to go about beating England, and got destroyed all over again!

[Zainub]

Bumble's thoughts are interesting. Colin Croft has said his two penny's worth on this on BCC Sport, he doesn't actually say a lot about Chanderpual, but has nevertheless made no secret of his dislike of Lara's captaincy, you can read the full column here

Originally Posted by CC

The West Indian cricket fraternity normally makes the mistake of making the most dominant player of the team the captain of the team, Gary Sobers being the first example. The two most successful captains of the modern era, Clive Lloyd and Rohan Kanhai, were not the dominant player of their respective teams. When he took over from Courtney Walsh, Lara was too divisive, very much like a politician, using the tactics of "divide and rule" to get some of his team behind him.

Originally Posted by CC

The cracks had been showing in 1995, when Lara suggested that cricket was ruining his life, and those cracks opened up to chasms in South Africa. Lara just could not control his team on the field, perhaps getting some of his own medicine back from his earlier days on the team.

Originally Posted by CC

With no-one else to turn to, the West Indies cricket fraternity turned back to Lara in 2003. At the time I felt the move was justified, since the great left-hander had suggested that he was "more mature" and acted it too. But the 12-Test spell in charge has, to me, been doomed to failure because he, like Viv Richards, failed to understand that not everyone was as great as he was. Additionally, Lara could not motivate his team to lift their performances together. The recent sponsorship row was the final straw. Even though he was not directly seen as being a party in the argument, Lara has been seen again as someone who did not show leadership when he really should have.

[cantplaycantalk]

I think that Lara's decision in the final test was that he was damned if he was going to give England ANY chance of a whitewash! Also to come out of the series with a win in a dead rubber would not really have done much for West Indies morale. The world record score did at least prove a lift to West Indian morale even if it did little else.
The idea of keeping England out on the field also did have some point, the English batsmen never knew when they needed to get themselves into a frame of mind to start batting, and when they eventually had to put the pads on they were so mentally jaded by 2+ days in the field they collapsed badly in the first innings, it was only the long England batting line up added to the flatness of the pitch and the weakness and inexperience of the West Indian attack that allowed England to escape with a draw in the game in the end.

As to Lara as a captain, no he is not a great leader of men, whatever you think of his tactical abilities, he lacks the man management, and motivational qualities of a true leader. I don't know if Chanderpaul will be a great captain but the team seem to gell around him already, he is likeable and you can't say it has hurt his batting form so far

As to the West Indies board, perhaps some of them would be better looking personnal sponsorship deals with Walker Kickstone?

[Ninjaman]

I was in Antigua and there was no one in the ground complaining about a late declaration by Lara.

Everyone felt he did the right thing as there was MORE than enough time to bowl England out. And when they enforfed the follow-on everyone was happy.

It is only when the bowlers could not finish the job that we hear criticism of Lara

Lara did not throw any game away, the bowlers were not good enough to take the potential victory on offer.They had loads of overs to get England's 20 wickets and could not do it.

If they had a half decent attack able to be good in the 2nd innings and not tire, we would not even be talking abouit this

The similarities between that match and the recently concluded one in Guyana are there for all to see.

What was important was not to let England 4-0 us and that was acheived.

3-0 or 3-1 doesn't matter, still a beating!

His team got about 220 overs against England and could not do it.

Chanderpaul's team last week got just about the same amount of overs to do it and they also could not do it.

Chanderpaul is criticised for declaring too early and Lara for declaring too late. And the likelihood that weather would spoil the game was greater in Guyana than in Antigua.

If you are going to use one game to crucify someone at least be consistent.

So I will say again that he is not anywhere near as good a captain as he is a batsman but no captain can work with dodgy tools.

[Ninjaman]

Originally Posted by Kirsty Harris

Totally agree - but many WI fans seem to have viewed the world record as being more significant than the win. A bit puzzlung to me, as I feel that a win in that game would have put them in a better state of mind, at the very least, for the return fixture in England. Instead, they turned up a defeated looking bunch who had no idea how to go about beating England, and got destroyed all over again!

Why would you find that puzzling??

Lara brought a record back to the WI.

Losing 3-0 or 3-1 is still a loss.

47 all out was still a reality.

If you think that winning that game would have helped them in the tour of England, Lord help you

For one thing, the board, after sending so many young bowlers to England, could have also sent a bowling coach but it didn't.

[Ninjaman]

Originally Posted by Zainub Razvi

Bumble's thoughts are interesting. Colin Croft has said his two penny's worth on this on BCC Sport, he doesn't actually say a lot about Chanderpual, but has nevertheless made no secret of his dislike of Lara's captaincy, you can read the full column here
[/font]

Hardly any West Indian takes Colin Croft serious.

His hatred of Lara is quite open and it extends to more than his captaincy. Just pure hatred of Lara.

Lara is no saint and has done many things he might not be proud of but it amazes me how every Tom, Dick and Harry has criticism of him on the tip of their tongue and he hardly ever, if at all, chooses to respond.

For all Croft's hatred of Lara, it must hurt him that for all Brian's transgressions, he is still admired and revered, yet Croft, 20 years on from taking racist people's money to become an "honorary white" will never get that respect.

Pure jealousy in some people's hearts

[Xiwang]

Ninjaman, I could not have said it any better and I totally agree with it all. (That is your last 3 replies) With respect to Colin Croft, when it comes to Lara he sees red-- they just don't mix. Whether it is hatred or not, who cares. I doubt Lara does.

[Occasional Fan]

I think someone suggested above that the West Indian fans felt that Lara's 400 record was more important than winning the match, given the state of the series at the time. I was a little surprised, but you chaps seem to have confirmed it. I'm not saying you're wrong, you understand: I'm just a little surprised.

Now, after the draw in the first test, are your guys going to take the second off the South Africans?

I'll open a new thread for that line of discussion in Current International Matches