Lara does a volte-face on England tour

By Michael Henderson

LONDON, MAY 12. Brian Lara has consented to join the West Indies tour of England this summer. Say ``thank you'' everybody.

The staff at Heathrow can order a carpet of welcome this very day, and nobody should be in the least bit surprised if an angelic choir of customs officers rehearse a few thrilling choruses of Lo! The Conquering Hero Comes.

We should be honoured by Lara's presence. Zimbabwe is not grand enough for him, and neither is Pakistan, which is one match through a three-Test series in the Caribbean. Evidently, a tour of England is a different proposition and he can expect to resume his place in the West Indies side when the first of five Tests begins at Edgbaston on June 15.

The absence of one confused player, however gifted, would not have ruined anybody's summer. As late as Tuesday, when Lara faxed the West Indies Board of Control with his decision not to tour, Jimmy Adams was set to lead a Lara-less party to England. That might not have been such a bad thing.

Adams, who succeeded Lara as captain earlier this year, has tried hard to rekindle a spirit of amity within a dressing-room that had grown sour. Now he has to accommodate a man with a keen sense of his own worth who has discovered that the world will not necessarily do his bidding.

For some little time, Lara, surrounded by what F Scott Fitzgerald called ``the foul dust'' that preyed on Jay Gatsby, has made an easy target, which is not to say he has not been complicit in his fall from grace. While his feats with the bat demand recognition, his judgment has often been faulty to the point of perversity.

According to a report on Thursday from Tony Cozier, the respected and well-informed Barbadian cricket writer, it was not impossible that Lara would make his temporary leave-taking permanent. He still might, of course. Nobody knows his mind these days, least of all himself, otherwise he would not have found it necessary to visit an American psychologist, as he did last month.

In announcing the selection of a 16-man party, the West Indies board put Lara's reluctance to tour down to concern over his mother's health. Given the peculiar sequence of events in recent months, and the player's puzzling behaviour, it is wise to keep an open mind. Roger Skerrett, the tour manager, said that Lara would still be able to return home if circumstances demanded.

The feeling is that Lara is so far removed from the world he grew up in that retirement would come as a release. It is clear from his erratic behaviour that he is not enjoying life, and equally clear that his problems do not coincide with the best interests of West Indian cricket. In such circumstances it may be better for him to go than to carry on without conviction.

It seems an eternity ago but is in fact one brief year since he made three sparkling hundreds against Australia, including an innings of 153 not out that enabled the West Indies to win a marvellous Test match by one wicket in Barbados. It was brilliant stuff, forged out of adversity after the West Indies had gone a game behind in the series, but it seemed to be more like a call for help.

The wretched business in New Zealand last winter, when the West Indies lost both Tests and all five one-day internationals, proved to be the breaking point for Lara the captain. However poorly the team played in South Africa the previous year, when it lost 0-5, the humiliation of losing in New Zealand - the first Test by nine wickets after the opening pair had made 276 - prompted Lara to fall on his sword.

He had coveted the captaincy, to the extent of undermining Courtney Walsh's authority, and so to hand it over unfulfilled after only two years in office was a personal affront to a man with such a clear sense of his destiny. The player who made 375 against England six years ago, and then 501 for Warwickshire against Durham, had become a broken man and that is, sadly, how he is perceived.

``If you ask me to talk about Bobby Moore the player,'' said Ron Greenwood, who managed the England captain at West Ham, ``I could talk all night. Bobby Moore the man, and that's a different matter.'' How much more true that is of Lara, who has exhausted the goodwill of everybody in the Caribbean outside his native Trinidad.

His conduct as a player under Walsh, and under Richie Richardson before him, bore few marks of grace. The way they tolerated his truculence was remarkable, to the point that Walsh, one game after being deposed, put his arm round Lara when they walked out at Sabina Park in front of a Jamaican crowd hostile to Walsh's successor.

Now he returns to the ranks, humbled by personal failure and an inability to cope with it, under the leadership of another Jamaican. Adams has always been regarded as an equable man, a popular man and a team man.

How he deals with the cult of Lara's personality may present at least as many problems this summer as England's players.

There is plenty of bowling experience in the West Indies party. Five years after he waved goodbye to the crowd at the Oval at the end of the last tour, to signal his farewell to England, Curtly Ambrose is back again. So is the indestructible Walsh, the record wicket-taker in Tests.

The back-up is supplied by Franklyn Rose, Reon King, Nixon McLean and Corey Collymore - but the only specialist slow bowler in the party is leg-spinner Mahendra Nagamootoo.

In fast bowling Adams is well served. But the batting line-up looks fragile and nobody can possibly say with certainty what his bewildered predecessor is going to give him.

The team (with players' age and number of Tests played): J.C. Adams (captain) (age 32-caps 42); S.L. Campbell (vice-captain) (29-39); C.E.L. Ambrose (36- 91); S. Chanderpaul (25-40); C.H. Gayle (20-3); A.F.G. Griffith (29-8); W.W. Hinds (23-3); R.D. Jacobs (wk) (32-14); R.D. King (25-6); B.C. Lara (31-65); N.A.M. McLean (26-9); F.D. Rose (28- 15); C.A. Walsh (37-115); R. Sarwan (19-0), M.V. Nagamootoo (24- 0), C.D. Collymore (22-0).

Itinerary:

Tests: June 15-19 (Edgbaston); June 29-July 3 (Lord's); August 3- 7 (Old Trafford); August 17-21 (Headingley); August 31-September 4 (The Oval).

Triangular tournament: July 6 (Bristol day/night) v Zimbabwe; July 9 (Lord's) v England; July 11 (Canterbury) v Zimbabwe; July 15 (Riverside) v England; July 16 (Riverside) v Zimbabwe; July 20 (Trent Bridge) v England; July 22 (Lord's) Final.

- Copyright, The Telegraph Group Ltd, London, 2000

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