Bowlers found wanting

Chester-Le-Street- The West Indies have reached a stage, all too familiar on successive overseas tours, where they seem incapable of winning a match.

After the overwhelming victory over England in the first Test by an innings within three days, they lost the second after leading by 188, endured their fourth defeat, and confirmed their elimination from the NatWest Series of One-Day Internationals yesterday.

With 105 off 137 balls from Sherwin Campbell, the first hundred of the tournament after seven matches, 87 off 76 balls from Brian Lara and their third-wicket partnership of 163 from 24.3 overs, West Indies amassed 287 for five wickets.

It was the highest total of the tournament and their highest since their 314 for six against Bangladesh in Dhaka last October 21 matches ago. Still it proved inadequate.

In the first close match of the series, Zimbabwe, already assured of their place in Saturday's final, passed it with five balls and four wickets in hand through a perfectly paced, record, unbeaten fifthwicket partnership of 186 off 26 overs between Murray Goodwin and Grant Flower.

West Indies, who had the slimmest chance of staying in the race, were left to again go back to the drawing board, as captain Jimmy Adams put it afterwards, and prepare for the resumption of the Test series when their inexperience will be shortened by the return of Courtney Walsh, Curtly Ambrose and Shivnarine Chanderpaul.

Goodwin followed Campbell's second One-Day International hundred with his own, 112, while Flower's 96 off 86 balls trumped even Lara's earlier dominance.

It was marvellous entertainment for a crowd of 6 000 who got full value for their half-price admission in weather that quickly changed from another gray, shivering morning into an afternoon of welcome sunshine.

This was no consolation to the West Indies whose bowlers were once again found wanting in nerve and basic skill.

In their two back-to-back defeats over the weekend, by England on Saturday and yesterday's, they conceded 577 runs off 84.1 balls, from which the opposition lost four wickets, two run out, at a rate of nearly five-and-a-half runs an over.

Looked enough

The stand of 163 off 150 balls between Campbell and Lara was the basis of a West Indies total that seemed sufficient to end their depressing sequence of three successive defeats.

But, on a pitch ideally prepared for the batting spectacle that the One-Day game is supposed to be and against rejigged and undistinguished bowling that brought in leg-spinner Mahendra Nagamootoo for his first international, Goodwin, in his 69th such match, and Flower, in his 130th, utilised all their skill and know-how to time their chase to perfection.

They came together at 104 for four in the 23rd over when captain Andy Flower was fourth out, the second run-out victim, to Chris Gayle's direct hit from short fine-leg.

Two other dangermen, Neil Johnson and Alistair Campbell, had also been removed cheaply and opener Guy Whittal, top-scorer with 83 in their previous meeting in Canterbury last Tuesday, had gone for 23.

Merv Dillon accounted for both the left-handed Johnson, whose insideedge was gathered by Ridley Jacobs low to his right, and Whittal sliced a drive to backward point.

Campbell run out

When Campbell was run out through a combination of Nagamootoo's diving save at cover and Goodwin's stationary response at the non-striker's end and Andy Flower quickly followed, Zimbabwe were down to their last two main batsman and victory was a distance away.

Goodwin and the young-er Flower brother kept the goal in sight by finding the gaps and taking toll of the loose balls that came.

They had their scrapes but capitalised on a West Indies attack unusually comprising three spinners who had to share 20 of the overs.

There was the inevitable run-out chance or two as the Zimbabweans sprinted their singles and twos. Goodwin should have been stumped by the fumbling Jacobs off Nagamootoo when he was 31 and Flower earned a six that carried him to 50 after the television replay revealed that Ricardo Powell's foot was on the ropes when he caught him off Jimmy Adams' hopeful left-arm spin.

With 15 overs remaining, 116 were needed, with ten to go the deficit was 90. As the equation got closer, the West Indians lost their nerve while the two Zimbabweans kept theirs.

Nixon McLean conceded only 25 from his first six overs but went for 14 from his last. Dillon gave away only 32 in his first eight but 20 from his last two, including 13 from his last.

Costly overs

Adams was again at a loss to know who to turn to. He entrusted the task of bowling overs 45 and 47 to Nagamootoo, in his first international, and they went for 17. He called up Gayle, 20, and in his 19th, to get through the 49th over with 15 needed off the last two and the off-spinner went for 11.

Only four were required off the final over and, after Reon King started with a no-ball. Flower blasted the next to the extra-cover boundary to the whooping delight of the two Zimbab-weans in the middle, their team-mates in the dressing room and the two dozen flagwaving supporters who captain Flower went out of his way to thank at the presentation ceremony.

It was another crushing disappointment for the West Indies but at least there was personal satisfaction for Campbell and another indication that Lara is returning to his best.

Campbell once called the modern Riverside Stadium home during his season with Durham in 1996 but had only once passed 50 for his county on the ground. Now he overcame an uncertain start to bat with increasing confidence.

He and Wavell Hinds set the innings off with a partnership of 86 that was dominated by Hinds' blistering off-side strokes.

Drives and cuts reminiscent of Clive Lloyd brought him seven fours in 42 off 63 balls before he swung the first ball he faced from Dirk Viljoen into square-leg's lap.

Lara, mysteriously limping at first, took his place at his reinstated position of No.3 and both he and Campbell were in full flow when they were both dismissed by Viljoen within two balls of each other in the 46th over.

Lara's scalp was gratifying revenge for Viljoen who had been earlier savaged for 22 in one over with two straight sixes and a four by the left-hander.

Lara donned sunglasses and Ramnaresh Sarwan's borrowed shirt but there was no mistaking his identity as he stroked three sixes and six fours.

It was his second half-century in two days.

Thankfully, not everything was gloom for the West Indies.