277 - When Lara came of age
For all of Brian Charles Lara's iconic innings was the 277 in Sydney the most important?
501*, 400*, 375, 277, 213, 153*
Say the name Brian Lara and any of the aforementioned innings will immediately roll off the tongue, however David Windram argues that the 277 at the SCG was in fact the most memorable of them all…
Brian Lara made an inauspicious start to his test career, averaging a tick over 30 in his first four Test matches, with a highest score of 64.
Having caught the eye of Garfield Sobers during his younger days, and representing West Indies with distinction at various youth levels, hopes were high that he could be the man to continue West Indian dominance into the 90s.
The first major test of Lara’s Test career would come on the tour to Australia in 1992/93. As Lara took guard at the famous Sydney Cricket Ground in the Third Test, the immediate concern was not whether the youngster had a future at international level, but the peril that West Indies found themselves in within the series.
Australia not won a series against the West Indies since 1975/76 and were determined not to allow that dominance to continue into another decade.
The First Test in Brisbane was drawn as Ian Bishop and Courtney Walsh managed to block out a draw on the final day with two wickets remaining. Australia then won the Second Test on the back of first innings centuries from Mark Waugh and Alan Border, alongside 7 wickets from youthful leg spinner Shane Warne, setting up the pivotal Third Test at the SCG.
With the prospect of such a long-awaited series win against the men in maroon on the horizon, Australia, as they so often did in the decade to come, looked to assert their dominance from ball one. Batting for nigh on two days the Aussies put up a commanding total of 503 before declaring shortly prior to the end of the second evening.
West Indies lost Phil Simmons prior to the close of the day's play, followed by Desmond Haynes early the next morning, leaving them in strife at two wickets down and only 30 runs on the board. A draw being the only real prospect of avoiding a 2-0 series deficit with two tests remaining, a major innings from the next man to the crease was essential if any hopes of avoiding a series defeat were to be realised.
The 23 year old Lara strode to the centre of the SCG for his eleventh test innings with the hopes of Caribbean cricket fans resting squarely on his young shoulders.
When retrospectively discussing Lara’s innings, Ian Chappell recalls being asked to provide a young Lara with some advice at the previous year’s World Cup. Chappell acknowledged that the technical talent was evident, however “he kept hitting the ball to fielders and wasting a lot of runs by not hitting gaps”.
The subsequent work Lara put in to combat this was immediately in evidence, the left hander getting off the mark by slapping Craig McDermott through the covers for four with a shot that reverberated around the sleepy SCG like the crack of a pistol.
The violence with which Lara attacked McDermott and Merv Hughes defied the knife edge that the game, and series, was balanced on. In contrast, the Aussie spin bowling duo of Warne and Greg Matthews were slowly picked apart with a variety of delicately caressed sweeps and surgical clips. The precise nature of the shots reflected the maturation of a batter who realised that he couldn’t go on wasting runs by picking out fielders, the outfield dissected time and again. The fact that overnight rain and drizzly weather had rendered the conditions difficult seemed irrelevant as Lara batted on.
A maiden century, and inevitable double century, were both brought up off the bowling of Shane Warne, with Lara already showing the technical aptitude that would result in many regarding him as one of the all-time greats against spin bowling.
As Lara slowly took the possibility of a win away from Australia, he was accompanied in the middle by captain Richie Richardson. The duo batted for the remainder of day three, and beyond, while combining for 293 runs.
When Richardson was finally dismissed Lara was beginning to show visible signs of fatigue. Shots crept, rather than flew to the boundary, and the young man could barely lift his bat up to acknowledge a further landmark of 250, after a quick single, which had it been cleanly fielded at mid-wicket, would almost certainly have been out. 257 was reached with a back foot cut through the offside and with it the highest first class score by a West Indian in Australia.
The end inevitably arrived by way of run out, as Lara set off for a run only to be sent back by Carl Hooper and not having the energy to make up his ground, despite a desperate dive. As Lara trudged from the field the disappointment at the nature of the dismissal was softened by the fact that the Test had been saved, West Indies eventually being dismissed for 606 and a first innings lead of 103.
The remainder of the test was played out to a draw. However, the value of Lara’s innings was put into context as the series progressed. One of the all-time great test matches was won by a single run on the back of a bowling performance for the ages by Curtly Ambrose in Adelaide, thus setting up a deciding test in Perth. In truth, the final test was something of an anti-climax. The beleaguered Australians slumping to an innings defeat as the wait for a series win against the all-conquering West Indians continued into a new post-Viv Richards era.
An outcome no one would have predicated on the close of day 2 at the SCG but for the genius of a young Brian Lara.
Within the next 18 months Lara became a global superstar, posting the highest ever First-Class score (501*) and achieving the highest individual score in a test innings (375), catapulting him to fame beyond cricket.
Inevitably the time for West Indian dominance came to an end as the Australians won back The Frank Worrell Trophy at the next time of asking, after a shock win in the Caribbean.
Thus, the pattern for the next decade and a half was set; Brian Lara’s individual brilliance operated alongside West Indian under achievement. The Frank Worrell trophy has remained in Australian hands ever since.
David Windram
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