Tony Becca

THE FIRST Test match between the West Indies and Pakistan in Lahore ended, not surprisingly, in victory for the home team - and an easy one at that.

After winning the toss and electing to bat first, the West Indies were routed for 206, Pakistan replied with a commanding 485 for a lead of 279 and but for an impressive 122 by captain Brian Lara and a solid 81 by Shivnarine Chanderpaul, the West Indies were bundled out for 291 and lost the contest, or whatever it may be called, by nine wickets.

To many a West Indian, it was tough luck - tough luck because of the conditions when the West Indies batted first, because of the pitch which was slow and tough luck because of a few umpiring decisions which seem to have gone against them.

To a few, however, to those looking at the game analytically and not as passionate West Indians, when Lara won the toss he had the power to do what he wanted to do - to bat or not to bat, and maybe he decided to bat first simply because he did not want to bat last on that pitch against the dangerous legspinner Danish Kaneria.

Toss

When Lara won the toss, he knew that it was a Test match, and as he himself has said, he expected the batsmen, the first three at least, to be capable of fighting out tricky situations - to struggle for an hour or two at the start.

As far as the umpiring decisions were concerned, as Lara himself has said, maybe because he got away with an appeal for leg before wicket early in the first innings, that's all part of the game.

The fact is that apart from underlining the difference between the one-day version of the game when one moment of brilliance can change the tide and lead to victory and the five-day version which calls for consistency, the West Indies performance was neither strange nor surprising. In fact, looking back at the batting, bowling and the fielding, it was business as usual.

Hitting the ball

In terms of the batting, none of the batsmen, but for Lara in both innings, Chanderpaul in the second, and Christopher Gayle who simply loves to hit the ball, batted like Test batsmen. In fact, by getting out the same way almost every time, by playing, like Ramnaresh Sarwan, Dwayne Bravo and Denesh Ramdin, across the line of the ball so blatantly and so often, they looked like schoolboys - and young schoolboys at that.

As far as the bowling was concerned, once again the West Indians, the pace bowlers, were lacking not only in consistency but also in skill.

Off the line

While the Pakistanis consistently pitched the ball on a good length and got it sometimes to swing through the air, some times to cut off the pitch, and to bounce appreciably, the West Indians, especially the faster Jerome Taylor and Fidel Edwards, were all over the place and presented the Pakistani batsmen with some nice juicy half-volleys and short-pitched deliveries on a pitch which, according to Mohammad Yousuf, who scored an impressive 192, was lovely for batting.

Although he did not reap the rewards he should have, easily the best of the West Indians was Corey Collymore. Like Umar Gul and Shahid Nazir, he bowled a good line and a good length, he got the ball to cut off the seam and to bounce uncomfortably, and he kept the batsmen guessing.

As far as their fielding was concerned, by dropping a few catches and fumbling a number of times in the field, it was business as usual for the West Indies who are notorious for their inconsistency - for being brilliant one day and poor for a few days after that.

The West Indies move on to Multan for the second Test starting on Sunday, and despite the optimism of Lara - the captain who baffled everyone by replacing Gayle with Taylor with one wicket to go after the part-time offspinner had ended the seventh-wicket partnership between Yousuf and Kamran Akmal at 148 by taking the wickets of Akmal, 78, and Yousuf for a handful of runs, things do not look good for the tourists. Their batsmen, but for Lara and Chanderpaul, looked like amateurs on a pitch on which their bowlers and their fielders allowed Pakistan to score almost five hundred runs despite picking up the wickets of Younis Khan for 11 and captain Inzamam ul-Haq for zero.

As long as there is life, however, there is hope, and as long as Lara, Chanderpaul and Gayle are in their batting line-up, as long as Taylor, Edwards and Collymore are in their bowling attack, there is hope, if they click, for the West Indies to win their second Test match in their last 16 and level the three-match contest at 1-1.