Ian Ward's century puts England 'A' on top against Barbados

The phenomenal heavy-scoring of Ian Ward continued yesterday to the detriment of a Barbados team that made no impression in spite of a change of pitch at Kensington Oval.

Ward, a 27-year-old left-hander who came into the fourth round Busta match with an unbelievable 444 runs and a staggering average of 111, batted through the day to complete his third hundred of a fairy-tale tournament.

Solid from his first ball to his 306th, the England 'A' opening batsman attempted nothing rash and hardly played a false stroke in an unbeaten 133 that carried his aggregate to 577 runs.

He must be somewhat disappointed that the US$50 000 on offer to the first Caribbean batsman to reach 1 000 runs has not been extended to the visitors. At the rate he is going, he is almost certain to come close to the landmark that many felt was unattainable.

It was a busy day for statisticians after a rare double-century firstwicket stand between Ward and Mike Powell in which third-placed Barbados toiled long and hard without success.

They were finally able to break the stand after exactly five hours in which Ward and the right-handed Powell put on 224, which was 66 short of the 290 put on by the Leewards' Richie Richardson and Livingstone Lawrence against Trinidad and Tobago at the Antigua Recreation Ground in 1984.

There were very few times yesterday that Barbados threatened to dislodge Ward and Powell.

The change of surface that was supposedly expected to offer more assistance to the faster bowlers made no difference to the Barbadians after the visitors chose to bat first.

During the first two sessions in which the scoring rate averaged 45 runs per hour, the closest Barbados came to separating the openers was when Sean Armstrong, stationed at forward short-leg, failed to clutch onto an offering that was firmly played into his chest.

The fortunate batsman was Powell, who was 33 at the time and having a couple of problems against teenaged off-spinner Ryan Austin.

By then, however, England 'A' had posted 75, with 63 coming in the first hour when most of the lashes were reserved for Barbados captain Ian Bradshaw.

In spite of his rich form in the tournament, Ward came to Barbados with a reputation as a dour batsman who steadily accumulates his runs. It was a comment made on the basis that he spent very long periods over his 49, 69, 109, 13 not out, 118 and 86 not out in the first three matches which were reportedly played on very slow pitches in St. George's and Port-of-Spain.

On the evidence of what he displayed yesterday, no one could suggest he was merely a blocker. He was fluent in his strokeplay from the word go and even outscored Powell, who was the much faster scorer when they put on 134 in the first innings of their previous match.

For most of the day, they were on each other's trail. In a lunch-time score of 97, Ward was 47 and Powell 44 and when the pair returned to the Garfield Sobers Pavilion two hours later to another standing ovation from about 40 of their countryman on the balcony upstairs, the total was 183 with Ward nine shy of his seventh first-class century and Powell on 81.

Ward reached his hundred with his eighth boundary, a sweep off legspinner Dave Marshall and Powell appeared set to join him in tripledigits when he inexplicably gifted his wicket at 4 p.m.

Powell was on 96 when he attempted a reverse sweep against a straight, faster ball from Austin. It ended an innings that included seven fours and a six from 212 balls.

The six was lifted over mid-wicket off Austin from the ball after Armstrong missed the difficult chance, and it was the first of two sixes struck off Austin.

Outside of those, the 19-year-old off-spinner, playing in only his second first-class match, created a favourable impression in the 35 overs he sent down.

Of the other Barbadian bowlers, only Hendy Bryan looked like taking a wicket. He came on at a stage when the openers were in full flow and immediately stemmed the flow of runs with a seven-over spell that cost eight runs.

Corey Collymore surprisingly only delivered nine overs in two short spells and was nothing more than tidy. The same could be said of legspinner Marshall.

The untidy Barbados bowler was Bradshaw.

The left-arm fast medium bowler was banged for 27 runs from his first three overs and when he came back for a second spell after lunch, he was immediately cracked for three boundaries in an over that cost 17 and never bowled again for the day.