West Indians endure nightmarish start to series

It might only have been the first day of a new Test series between Australia and West Indies but it nevertheless illuminated several fundamental realities. Of these, the most transparent is that it will require a massive turnaround from the West Indians to make this series genuinely competitive. And then some.

While there was much to celebrate for a very healthy Thursday crowd of 19878 here at the 'Gabba ground in Brisbane, there was as much to mourn. For this was an occasion which highlighted the growing chasm that is beginning to emerge between some of the best and some of the worst teams in the contemporary Test arena.

An overstatement of the position? An over-reaction to the events of a mere six hours? Well, maybe. But the portents of doom in the West Indians' slide to a paltry first innings total of 82 - not to mention the concession, already, of a deficit to the Australians, who have reached 1/107 by stumps - were unmistakable.

The West Indians had carried dismal batting form into this match after hidings at the hands of Western Australia and Victoria. Today, matters descended to truly disastrous proportions.

On a pitch that seemed to offer far less in terms of pace and bounce than might have been anticipated by the Australians upon winning the toss, it was Glenn McGrath who was at the core of the tourists' problems. Conceiving fast bowling that was high on quality and high on intelligence, he returned the extraordinary figures of 6/17 from twenty tight and disciplined overs. In the face of his onslaught, there was little that any of the West Indians - Brian Lara (0) included - seemed to be able to produce in the way of resistance.

Depending on one's perspective about the quality of Test cricket at present, the chain of events to which McGrath gave expression in the post-lunch session served as the cause of either incredulity or depression. Or maybe both. Whatever their exact nature, the basic facts were these. After reaching the mark of 2/53 fifteen minutes beyond the break, the West Indians surrendered their next seven wickets for fourteen runs. Another fifteen runs were somehow accrued from a contextually magnificent last wicket partnership between Jimmy Adams (16*) and Courtney Walsh (9). But by then, the damage in a phase that brought the overall clatter of eight wickets for a total of only thirty-seven runs had well and truly been inflicted.

During a display through which the West Indians seemingly found the exercise of middling the ball a near-impossible assignment, the paceman claimed 4/0 in the space of ten deliveries at one stage as carnage reigned around him. He beat the bat relentlessly and, even when some form of willow was applied to ball, it seemed inevitably to come in the form of an edge into an increasingly heavily-packed slip cordon. Twice, he found himself on the verge of hat-tricks; twice, they were only narrowly averted.

"I couldn't have asked for a better day," he enthused.

"The West Indies haven't really had a great start to their tour here, and we thought we could put the pressure straight on them. That was our game plan and it worked out pretty well."

"My game plan whenever we've played against the West Indies has just been to remain patient, build the pressure up. It's worked in the past so I thought why not stay on that track," he said of his unerring line and length.

That the tourists wedged the run out of Ramnaresh Sarwan (0) - as he ridiculously attempted a second run with Ricky Ponting in rapid pursuit of a ball to short fine leg - into the mess as well only underlined the parlous extent of the capitulation. With the exception of Shivnarine Chanderpaul (20), Daren Ganga (18) and Adams, the entire line-up was swept away in a fashion that defied belief.

Vice-captain Sherwin Campbell (10) had been the first to depart, after a forty-five minute stay that, in hindsight, made his effort one of the more stoic performances of the innings. Along with Ganga, he weathered the opening spell of McGrath and Brett Lee (1/24) relatively painlessly, in fact. But, once he departed after edging a Stuart MacGill (1/10) leg break to slip, the foundation for the ensuing rot was in place. Australian captain Steve Waugh rapidly swung McGrath back into the attack and, with the very first ball of a new spell, he teased old sparring partner Lara (0) into issuing a loose, outside edged defensive shot at a ball that cut marginally away. The symbolism in the star's brisk departure from the crease was unarguable.

After the brief respite that came in the form of the luncheon interval, Ganga edged Andy Bichel (1/25) to slip and Chanderpaul fell to a lazy drive at McGrath. Sarwan departed next and then Ridley Jacobs (2), Nixon McLean (0), Mervyn Dillon (0) and Marlon Black (0) all joined the queue of McGrath victims shambling hastily back in the direction of the pavilion. Walsh showed that the job of defying the New South Welshman was not as impossible as it might have looked but could not hold out for long against the speed of Lee, fending a lifting delivery to short leg.

It all left the visitors crashing to their third lowest score in history against Australia and a sub-one hundred total in a Test innings for the fourth time in less than two years. Compounded as it was by the sight of the Australians registering a century stand before Matthew Hayden (44) was run out, it also left the fate of this particular Test match seemingly already heading toward only one possible result.

So grave had the state of affairs become that not even the fact that Australian openers Michael Slater (54*) and Hayden both narrowly escaped a series of close appeals early in their respective innings seemed worthy of comment by the end. Nor did the sight of Dillon sustaining a leg injury while slipping on a plastic bottle as he pursued a ball toward the square leg boundary. More than enough, in fact, had been said by then.