da betobet： South Africa won a dramatic second Test against the West Indies in Portof Spain on Wednesday when they bowled the home side out for 162 to record a69-run triumph to take a one-nil lead in the five match series after theopening draw at the Bourda
MWP21-Mar-2001South Africa won a dramatic second Test against the West Indies in Portof Spain on Wednesday when they bowled the home side out for 162 to record a69-run triumph to take a one-nil lead in the five match series after theopening draw at the Bourda in Georgetown.When tea was taken at 143-6 with Carl Hooper unbeaten on 46 and 89 runsstill required, the crowd of close to 15 000 had every reason to believethat victory remained a possibility.But the slide began soon after the final session began and just 19 moreruns were added as Hooper watched on in sadness, unbeaten and unbowed at theend with 54 not out from 172 balls in three hours and fifty minutes ofclassy resistance.It was, in fact, a remarkable achievement for the home side to get soclose after a violent collapse in the first hour that saw them lose threewickets for one run to crash from 50-2 to 51-5 after resuming on theirovernight 32-1.Nightwatchman Dinanath Ramnarine (11) slashed a full length Allan Donalddelivery to Jacques Kallis at slip without adding a run but Marlon Samuels(9) played two of the shots of the day while he and opener Chris Gayle (23)brought up the team’s half-century.Then disaster.Samuels, like Ramnarine, edged Donald to Kallis and Gayle perished as aresult of retreating into a defensive shell and abandoning his normallyattacking approach. A tentative prod at Shaun Pollock resulted in an edge to’keeper Mark Boucher.The most valuable wicket, inevitably, belonged to Brian Lara and it wasclaimed for the third time in four innings by Makhaya Ntini – with a littlehelp from Dominican umpire Billy Doctrove who enjoyed an otherwise finematch. Lara’s delivery, however, pitched a long way outside leg stump. Thescorebook shows an 11-ball duck.Local hopes were revived with a disciplined sixth wicket stand of 92between Hooper and his 20-year-old fellow Guyanese, Ramnaresh Sarwan, as thetwo men batted through all but the last 10 minutes of the middle sessionwith the tourists’ bowlers looking increasingly desperate.So desperate, in fact, that Pollock called his disparate team togetherinto a ‘huddle’ 15 minutes before tea to deliver a motivational team talk.Whether it had any effect or not, the wicket fell five minutes later whenKallis induced a mistimed hook from Sarwan (39) which was superbly held at square leg by a furiously back-peddling Nicky Boje who also had thesun shining in his eyes.Ridley Jacobs (4) was magnificently run out by a Herschelle Gibbs directhit from cover five overs after tea and thereafter the end was swift as afired-up Kallis, who should have had Nixon McLean caught behind first ball,ripped into the tailenders.McLean (2) duly saved some of umpire Daryl Hair’s considerable blushesby edging Kallis once again to Boucher – this time for ‘real’ – and MervynDillon was trapped lbw in the same over for a second ball duck.Some of the gloss from a brilliant Test for Courtney Walsh was removedwhen Pollock hit his off stump to win the match, but by then there werestill over 20 overs remaining and he could not have been expected to survivethat long.