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Day 1: West Indies in pain

Garth Wattley

Michael Findlay and Joey Carew can grey no more. But with the way the ball is bouncing these days, Joel Garner will soon be grey-headed too. Certainly, the action yesterday between their President's XI and the visiting Australians at Guaracara Park would have eased their worries none.

Dismissed early in the last session for 177, the President's XI saw Australia reach 73 for 1 at the close on the first day of their four-day encounter.

Detained longer than they would have liked by the business of naming a captain, uncertain of the pool of fit players they can call on, the last thing the West Indies selectors needed was another headache. Then Daren Ganga walked from the field yesterday morning, harassed by a bad back.

The problem has been diagonsed as a strain of the lower back. And according to physiotherapist Roy Rogers, the injury is unrelated to the back trouble Ganga has already had this season.

But it was bothersome enough to restrict his movements. Troublesome enough that Ganga, once he had returned, could just reach out and edge a Stuart McGill delivery to wicketkeeper Ian Healy when 15.

It will not please the troubled selection trio that rest is what Ganga requires most. Having watched the Aussies' new leg-spin star Mc Gill clean up six Windies hopefuls for 45, they would hardly have managed a smile, save for the effort of Dave Joseph. Time had seemed to have run out on the 29-year-old.

But yesterday, with his side in the midst of a struggle, Joseph gave the selectors something to consider.

Never really mastering leg-spinners McGill or Shane Warne, the beefy, broad-shouldered Antiguan nevertheless employed typical forthright, hard-hitting tactics to get twelve boundaries in making a well-played 64.

Joseph was far and away, the success of the day for the President's XI, although Lincoln Roberts with 38 was promising. But the pair, who shared an 82-run third wicket partnership were the only ones to make any impression.

In fact, after a McGill delivery squared Joseph up and had him edging into the slips, the home team lost their last five wickets for just 36 runs.

Aussie dominance was established in the first session.

The total was only 13 when fastbowler Glen McGrath induced Suruj Ragoonath to snick a ball that left him to Healy.

McGrath, more hostile than new ball partner Jason Gillespie on the greenish pitch, also gave Dennis Rampersad a duck.

Having been fed a couple short, rising balls, flat-footed Rampersad drove fatally at the third of fuller length and Mark Waugh at second slip did the rest.

The total was now 14 for 2. And with three runs added, Ganga departed after eleven overs.

Joseph now joined Roberts and the attack-minded pair sought to play positively. Tested by the swing of first Gillespie and then the teasing Greg Blewett, Roberts had some anxious moments.

There was one boundary through the slips and occasions when the visible gap between bat and pad was almost breached. But Roberts also once again showed himself to be a player of sweet strokes.

The sizeable but pensive crowd were moved to make noise when Roberts used his feet and lifted Warne into the Petrotrin Sports Club at long-on. By lunch, taken at 69 for 2, Roberts had reached 31, Joseph 16.

But with 27 added after the interval, Mc Grath, with the first ball of a new spell bowled the driving Roberts through the gap.

Joseph, having survived his risky attempts to sweep against the spin, had settled however. He got four from a crisp square drive off the backfoot from a Gillespie delivery and hammered McGrath magnificently through extra cover to move to 49. A single took him to 50. But Joseph would have been disappointed that his final total was not 36 runs greater.

Skipper Keith Arthurton had also gone by then, bowled driving ill-advisedly at McGill.

And the leggie, getting prodigious turn, also accepted a return catch from wicketkeeper Wayne Philip, bowled swiping Nixon McLean and had last man Marlon Black stumped by Healy.

The President's XI bowlers could have done worse than emulate the accuracy and variation of the Aussies. But McLean, Black and Reon King rarely troubled openers Matthew Elliott (22) and Michael Slater (35 not out) until Mc Lean's best delivery angled down the corridor got Elliott to edge to Phillip.

Justin Langer will return this morning with Slater hoping to give the three Windies wise men more headaches.

Unless McLean and his mates can produce some painkillers.

Day 2: King shines but Australia in control

Shammi Kowlessar

Inspired by brilliant fast bowling from Reon King and sensible batting very late in the day by Suruj Ragoonath and Daren Ganga, the West Indies Cricket Board President's XI fought back in the final session after Australia's batsmen had hammered them for most of the second of the four-day match at Guaracara Park, Pointe-a-Pierre, yesterday.

Still the hosts, who were led by 191 on first innings, were still 158 runs in arrears when play ended because of fading light at 5.30 p.m with five overs remaining. But it could have been much worst.

When twin brothers Mark and Steve Waugh were blasting the ball to all parts of the field, it seemed that Australia would get much more than 368. But King, the one President's XI bowler who escaped unscathed yesterday, had other ideas as he put the world's No. 1 team firmly on the backfoot, claiming five for 75 off 25 overs to enhance his claim for Test selection.

The 23-year-old Guyanese broke the 127-run partnership - scored in just under two hours - when he forced Steve to edge to wicketkeeper Wayne Phillip.

And after Dennis Rampersad had ``bought'' Mark's wicket just after the visitors had reached 300, King came back from the tea interval to send back wicketkeeper Ian Healy, Shane Warne and Greg Blewett, in quick succession with admirable pace and accuracy. Healy (12) was leg before wicket while both Warne (4) and Blewett, who struggled for 39, were bowled by beauties. 302 for five became 341 for eight.

Although Mark Waugh added 55 for the fourth wicket with Blewett, the end of the complete dominance by the bat came at about 1.30 p.m. when Steve Waugh departed.

Batting for the first time since recovering from a hamstring injury which kept him out of the majority of the recent limited-overs competition against England and Sri Lanka, the new Australia skipper looked impressive for 57.

The knock contained eight fours and a six from 86 balls but Steve was still overshadowed by the more elegant Mark, who was on 76 when his brother went at 247 for four.

Mark, who had sounded a warning when he stroked boundaries for his first five scoring shots, went on to post Australia's first century of the tour. He celebrated by hitting the next ball he faced for six but, attempting to go over the top once more, was caught next ball by Nixon Mclean.

His 127-ball gem contained 14 sweetly struck fours and a six and his only previous error had been when he charged leg-spinner Rawl Lewis but was mis-stumped by Phillip. The hosts paid dearly for the mistake as Waugh, who had been 27 at the time, eventually made 106.

King compensated with his breathtaking bowling and after he broke the back of the batting, the unimpressive Mclean, who still ended up with four wickets, polished off the tail.

The West Indies fast bowler had struck the first blow of the morning when Michael Slater, attempting to hit his half-volley out of the ground, top-edged for Rampersad to take a running catch at fine-leg.

The opener fell one short of his half-century after his team had added 29 to their overnight score of 73 for one replying to 177 by the President's XI. Justin Langer (22) edged to the slips about 15 minutes later to give King his first wicket and the crowd opportunity to see the magnificent battling display by the Waughs.

Ganga, who was not on the field while the were in full flight, made his first appearance for the day at about 3.30 p.m. And the 20-year-old West Indies opener did not look to be troubled by the back problem he acquired in the first innings during his unbroken 33-run partnership with Ragoonath in the last 50 minutes of play yesterday.

Play resumes at 10.05 a.m.

Day 3: MacGill takes no prisoners

Garth Wattley

It was a quarter after two. And the Australians were out in the middle. Practising.

Their final warm-up match before the First Test against the West Indies had been scheduled to go four days. But less than two hours into the second session on the third day, some of the tourists were entertaining themselves with light practice on a bright afternoon at Guaracara Park.

The serious work was already done, Steve Waugh's men having demolished the President's XI by an innings and six runs.

``Dis is robbery with V!''

An aggrieved fellow near the pavilion was venting his spleen.

But that was more than any of the three West Indies selectors would dare do in public.

Hitting the jackpot in the Lotto was easier than prising a comment from the men in the hot seat. Indeed, it was difficult to find the right words to describe the latest West Indian batting debacle.

A hopeful Park had watched in hope as openers Suruj Ragoonath and Daren Ganga competently defied Glenn McGrath and Jason Gillespie and stretched their partnership from an overnight 33 to 99. Then, the bewildered crowd saw promise collapse in a heap.

Once Ragoonath departed for 53, 99 for 1 quickly became 126 for 4 at lunch and then 184 all out an hour and four minutes after the interval.

All the President's men had been sent packing, mesmerised by MacGill.

Stuart MacGill, the lethal Aussie leg-spinner had spun rings around the home team's batsmen in the first innings when he claimed six for 45.

But in the second innings, he was even more of a mystery. Flighting the ball tantalisingly, utilising the easterly breeze from the southern end and getting appreciable turn, MacGill was too much for the President's XI, finishing the innings with seven for 29.

The final three wickets were almost immaterial. It was really the first three that went before lunch and the fourth shortly after that that put the home side on the backfoot.

In a 12-minute spell inside the last half-hour of the first session, MacGill sent back Ragoonath, Ganga (29) and Lincoln Roberts (0) all in the space of three runs.

The shock was all the greater after the action of the first hour and a half.

In that period, neither McGrath's combination of short balls and bouncers nor Gillespie's swing had been able to dislodge the opening pair.

Ragoonath, pugnacious and positive as usual, gave as good as he got, cutting Gillespie repeatedly to the third man boundary.

Ganga, more circumspect, showed good technique against McGrath's short stuff. The sight of the tall quickmen leaving the attack seemed a victory for the batsmen.

But defeat was just around the corner.

Having accomplished the first part of what must have been Mission 100, Ragoonath fell. Driving in vain at a flighted delivery, Ragoonath, mis-stumped on 50, became the first of three stumping victims for wicketkeeper Ian Healy.

Ganga and Roberts proved no more competent against MacGill. Deceived in flight with the total on 101, Ganga edged into Mark Waugh's safe hands at slip.

The score had not changed when Roberts was walking dejectedly away, a MacGill delivery having beaten his forward prod and Healy going in a flash with the bails.

The ``other'' leggie, Shane Warne then chipped in with the wicket of Rampersad.

The Trinidad and Tobago number three completed a miserable pair when he casually cut Warne to Greg Blewett at backward point.

It was a silent lunch, West Indian disappointment making noise no option. But the sighs were audible after the interval as the procession continued.

Four runs were added before the MacGill-Healy combination struck again, this time first innings top-scorer, driving Dave Joseph (13).

Only skipper Arthurton remained of the recognised batsmen.

And while the procession continued at the other end, wicketkeeper Wayne Phillip, Rawl Lewis and hard-hitting Nixon McLean (14, three fours) all perishing, he hung on, playing a few well-timed drives off Warne in compiling 38 (6 fours) in 69 minutes.

He and last man Marlon Black added 24 and threatened to at least wipe off the deficit.

But then MacGill intervened again, having the captain caught by Healy. And Arthurton made a dejected departure, dignity denied to the last.