Bajan pace too hot for India

Fast bowling, the architect of several victories for West Indian teams over Indian opponents in years gone by, was the pillar of yet another resounding triumph at the Windward Club ground yesterday.

Red-hot Barbados, spearheaded by the energetic Tino Best and supported by Ian Bradshaw, Antonio Thomas and Dwayne Smith, completed an emphatic victory against India "A" with a day in reserve by the convincing margin of an innings and 77 runs.

It was the second successive win for Courtney Browne's men who have now jumped to an early lead in the Carib Beer Series.

India "A"', facing a big first innings deficit of 262, performed even worse than they did in the first innings and capitulated for 185 at 2:45 p.m.

Once more, they were distinctly uncomfortable against the faster stuff and skipper Browne did not even bother to turn to either Sulieman Benn or Ryan Hurley for a single over of spin.

"The Indians are very good to spin bowlers. You could see from the first innings how aggressive they are to spin," Browne said.

"I know they enjoy batting against slow bowling and I wanted to keep the spin away from them," Browne said.

His quartet of seamers admirably did the job and the Indians lasted only 50.1 overs.

Best bowled with plenty of fire, especially between lunch and tea when he grabbed all five of his scalps against batsmen whom he unsettled with his raw pace.

Two of his victims were palpably lbw, another had his off stump clobbered and another fended a catch to gully.

"Tino has a lot of pace. He is always willing to do well. Once he is used in short spells, he will always come good for you," Browne said about Best, who finished with five for 60 off 16 overs.

There were two wickets each for Thomas and Bradshaw with the latter enjoying the distinction of claiming the prized scalp of India "A" captain for a duck for the second time in the match.

The tall right-hander was bowled first ball to a delivery off fullish length to which he should have gone forward rather than back.

"Bradshaw is the work horse in the team. He works very hard and he is always talking to the younger bowlers," Browne said.

With Browne keen to keep spin away from the Indians, he called on Dwayne Smith's medium pace for 13 steady overs in which he removed one of the Indian's most promising batsmen in the match, Ambati Rayudu.

Barbados' victory has carried them to 24 points, six more than their nearest rivals, Guyana.

"I am very happy. We set about to defeat the Indians. This is what we wanted," Browne said.

"We were hoping they would come to the Caribbean with a bit of jet-lag We wanted to get at them early and see if we could knock them off and get 12 points.

"Team work did it for us. We sit and we talk a lot about the teams we are playing."

India "A" arrived in the Caribbean two days prior to the match and it is obvious they have not yet settled in.

Their 201 was inadequate on the opening day and they were always going to be under pressure after Barbados replied with an imposing 463.

"We did not play to our potential and Barbados totally outplayed us," Laxman said.

"The India "A" is potentially very good. It's disappointing, but at the same time, it's not really confidence demoralising.

"It was a long flight from India. It might have had an effect, but I thought the Barbados team played very well in all the departments of the game."

Laxman, however, is confident that his side will rebound and come good for their remaining matches.

"This is one of the best sides I have played with in the India "A" category and I am sure the guys will get their act together," he said.

Some of their batsmen got starts yesterday, but none carried on.

The topscore came from opener Akash Chopra, whose 43 off 97 balls was made in just under twoand-a-half hours. No one else reached 30, although Ruyudu and Jai Yadav both looked the part.