WI amass 300 against England

Bridgetown, Barbados, Apr 21 (UNI) An unfortunate Brian Lara ran himself out on 18 in his swansong appearance but the West Indies produced a virtuoso display of batting to amass 300 in the last Super Eight match of the World Cup here today, giving the master batsman a fitting farewell.

If Lara failed to sparkle, Chris Gayle (79 off 58 balls), Devon Smith (61) and later Marlon Samuels (51 off 39 balls) set the stadium afire putting up the best score by the hosts in this World Cup.

Although West Indies were all set put up even a bigger total at one stage, a disciplined bowling in the death by England got them all out with a ball to spare.

After losing Lara and man-in-form Ramnaresh Sarwan in the middle over, the West Indies innings at middle got bogged down a bit before being rescued by Samuels but not before part time off spinner Michael Vaughan picking up three wickets to emerge as the surprise best bowler of his team.

Earlier this morning, Chris Gayle put it upon himself to pay special tribute to his departing captain. Gayle, who has had a forgettable World Cup, made his intention clear from the very beginning and launched himself taking advantage of a depleted England bowling attack, which did not have Sajid Mehmood and Monty Panesar.

After digesting the first over from James Anderson, he specifically targeted Stuart Broad and Liam Plunkett and played one of the most memorable attacking innings from any West Indian batsmen in this World cup.

He overcame his sluggish foot movement with long handles and using the field restrictions to his advantage, he blazed away, enthralling the full house with ten fours three huge sixes.

In fact such was the ferocity of his innings that West Indies 50 came in the eighth over and twice umpire Simon Taufel had to save himself from being in the line of fire.

He picked up 22 runs from Plunket's fourth over which included the mightiest of sixes in the Kensington Oval as he slammed the upper stairs of the 3Ws stand.

He ended his innings at 79 when he tried to slash Flintoff's express delivery giving a hard-running catch to Stuart Broad at deep point.

But by the time Brian Lara walked into the wicket amidst the guard of honour from England and standing ovation from the admiring crowd, Chris Gayle and Devon Smith amassed 131 runs for the first wicket, the best opening partnership of the West Indies in the tournament so far.

Devon Smith was much quieter with Gayle and kept one end up solid, as Gayle was merciless from the other end. But he too went on to complete his half-century quietly although the cynosure of all eyes was Brian Lara.

Smith was removed by Flintoff when Collingwood took arguably the best catch of the tournament. As Smith slashed hard over point and ball was flying toward the boundary, Collinwood flung himself and in a gravity defying effort, plucked the catch with one hand from thin air to bring back England again to the match as the West Indies were threatening to shut it on their face within 30th over.

And then came the inevitable. Lara, who was laying well and was looking to present a memorable innings to the West Indian crowd, had to return dejected as Samuel stopped midway and Kevin Pietersen's accurate throw found him taking the final long walk back to the pavilion.

Lara was clearly disappointed being run out although he acknowledged the crowd twice from the boundary line while his team mates came down to receive him at the boundary line.

Towards the end Samuels and ever-reliable Chanderpaul took over the charge and carried on the destruction of England, who sorely missed the service Sajid and Monty. Both of them were rested to give chance to Broad and Punkett as this is the last match of the tournament for both the team having nothing at stake.

UNI