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Lara showed his strength in carrying a weak side

This article is more than 16 years old

The last 30 years have produced plenty of wonderful batting but, perhaps, only two truly great innings that were remarkable not only for their batsmanship, but also their timing and effect.

The second-best innings was by Ian Botham in 1981 when he plundered 149 not out off Australia at Headingley and set up that dizzying Tuesday when, for an unlikely morning, Bob Willis was the greatest bowler to have played the game. It transformed a series. The England team captained by Ian Botham had lost the first Test and were adrift. Mike Brearley was reinstated and Botham, freed from the shackles of captaincy, enjoyed the most lustrous period of a golden career. England won three consecutive victories and Botham played a major part in each one.

The best innings, however, was the 153 not out scored by Brian Lara in Barbados in 1999, also against Australia. It won a match that had seemed beyond reach when the West Indies were 98 for six in reply to Australia's first innings 490. It helped take his team from 105 for five in the second innings to their match-winning score of 311 for nine. This a team that after a pay dispute had been drubbed, in one of the grudge matches in world cricket, 5-0 away in South Africa and then been dismissed for 51 against Australia in the first Test. Only for Lara to level the series with 213 in the second Test - an innings Wisden described as follows: 'On one fantastic, sunny, windy, Sunday, Lara seduced the people of a bankrupt nation, resurrected his career as a batsman of rare gifts, and reignited cricket throughout the Caribbean.' Tony Cozier reckoned the double hundred to be the most significant innings ever played by a West Indian.

A fortnight later Lara topped it. He and Jimmy Adams put on 133 to bring their side within 70 of victory. It was unforgettable: the three boundaries he hit off Stuart MacGill's first over; the six off Shane Warne on to the roof of the Greenidge and Haynes stand. Having spent 47 balls to reach double figures, he moved on to his century in another 121 balls. This feat was achieved under almost unimaginable pressure with the grace that was the hallmark of his batting. One left-hander taking on the might of Australia.

Just before lunch Lara ducked into a bouncer from Glenn McGrath, at the height of his powers, and got up to take a leg-bye. He took his team to the cusp of victory only for McGrath to dismiss Adams, Ridley Jacobs and Nehemiah Perry in quick succession. So close.

Curtly Ambrose strode out to bat while the huge speakers in the Greenidge and Haynes stand blared out: 'Don't worry about a thing, every little thing's going to be all right.' Nice thought. Together, remarkably, they advanced to within a shot of victory. Lara's genius was evident not only in what he did on strike, but in how he conspired to keep it. He was, like Botham, not a great captain, but he was a fine team man.

With six needed, Ambrose was out, and out came Courtney Walsh - a man with a record 32 Test ducks to his name. Walsh survived and with a crunching drive through extra cover Lara completed the victory. He had scored 153; no one else got past 38.

'From the cruel crucifixion, to the renowned resurrection, to the astonishing ascension,' wrote Haydn Gill in the Barbados Nation. 'It will go down in the history books as one of the most spirited-ever revivals, the victory coming from the depths of despair.'

'Irrefutably, his undefeated 153 was the hand of a genius,' was the Wisden verdict. 'Exhibiting the new awareness and maturity he discovered in Jamaica, he brilliantly orchestrated the conclusion to an unforgettable match. He guided his men to victory as though leading the infirm through a maze.'

Two wonderful innings from two wonderful cricketers, but the difference lay in the opposition. Botham performed his heroics against a tepid Australia (Dyson, Wood, T Chappell, Hughes, Yallop, Border, Marsh, Bright, Lawson, Lillee, Alderman) featuring a couple of greats past their best and Hughes, rather than Border, was captain. Lara, on the other hand, performed his heroics against Slater, Elliott, Langer, M Waugh, S Waugh, Ponting, Healy, Warne, Gillespie, MacGill, McGrath - arguably the greatest team of all time.

That is what separates Lara from even Sachin Tendulkar and Ricky Ponting. He has scored the most runs in a first-class innings (501 not out for Warwickshire v Durham); the most runs in a Test innings (400 against England); the most runs in Test cricket (11,953); the most runs in a Test over (28 off South Africa's Robin Peterson). He has done all that when the going was easy. But when it was tough, and it was usually tough, he has also delivered.

As Ponting, who has benefited from being surrounded by good players, said: 'The thing a lot of people don't think much about with Brian Lara, is that he's basically had the weight of that whole team on his shoulders for the best part of 10 years now and had to carry their batting and win them games almost by himself. That sort of pressure going into every game, for him to be able to stand up and perform is something that should never be overlooked.'

He has been criticised for his captaincy but, to use the language of Wisden, the team he has had to lead has been very infirm and the maze very convoluted. The fast bowlers have gone and the politics and the lure of NBA basketball have made life for a West Indies captain most wearisome. 'The English have a soft spot for narratives of decline,' wrote Robert Winder, 'but it might be misleading to wonder, in the case of West Indian cricket, how far the mighty have fallen. The real surprise is that the team rose so high, that such a small and poor archipelago should have produced as many superlative sides as they did.'

As with West Indies cricket, so with Brian Lara. The notable thing is not that the production line ran dry, but that it should have been maintained for long enough to produce a talent as superlative as Lara. Yesterday, he appeared for a final time, once again in Barbados. England, quite rightly, lined up in a guard of honour. Lara doffed his helmet. The whole ground was on its feet. A meaningless match rendered memorable by the presence of one of the most vital batsman the game has witnessed.

There was a trademark cover drive off Andrew Flintoff and then Lara was run out by Marlon Samuels. At the very end, a man who throughout his career had done so much to mask the deficiencies of his team had been undone by the foible of a team-mate. It was sad, but it was apt.

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