What made it worse was that Thorpe had been out in identical fashion in the last Test and when Hooper came on the warning light should have flashed.These two dismissals were bad enough although Hooper has to take some credit for drifting one away with his arm which accounted for Stewart and for finding a fraction more bounce for Thorpe. Three of the main batsmen, Alec Stewart, Graham Thorpe and Mark Butcher, fought it out for more than two hours, each against the fast bowlers and then died soft deaths against spin. Over the years, Carl Hooper has thrived on the scathing criticism meted out to his off-spin bowling by Geoffrey Boycott and has become much more than an occasional bowler. But, even so, one would not have expected him to remove Stewart and Thorpe on a pitch which allowed him only the slowest of turn.The truth was that both batsmen relaxed at the sight of a spinner and their concentration snapped. This softness manifested itself again on the second day of the third Test when England were bowled out for 145. The bounce on Saturday was uneven enough to make survival, let alone stroke play, hard work. It was a timely innings by Chanderpaul, who mixed sturdy defence with some blistering shots, mainly through the off-side. Only the young Guyanese batsman's downfall will have disappointed him, although it did take a superb one-handed catch by Russell, diving to his left, to snaffle the edge.In hot breezy conditions, Headley's stamina was stupendous and he fully deserved the wickets that followed.
With Caddick blowing hot and cold and runs as precious as Headley's diamond ear stud, it was not an ideal tactic, and one Adams and Nixon McLean took advantage of.In a curiously low scoring game, culprits stand out like the ears of a certain fast bowler. Getting the ball to reverse swing, the Kent paceman found himself on a hat-trick after David Williams was lbw for a inauspicious pair and Ambrose was bowled by a beauty first ball.By this time Atherton, having overbowled Fraser and Headley, was rotating his bowlers more frequently than Chelsea do their strikers. England lost the first of the two Test matches here in Trinidad because they did not know how to win and played soft cricket at the end when the West Indies needed 282. By tea, only two boundaries had been scored off Angus Fraser, a tally in sharp contrast to Caddick's He gave that many away in his first over after lunch. However, with Fraser completely spent, and the West Indies lead creeping above 200, Caddick returned after tea to remove McLean, well caught by Alec Stewart at second slip..
Briefly silenced again, when Headley, who bowled far better yesterday, skidded one into Carl Hooper's pads to have the West Indies vice-captain lbw, the Possee were ominously upbeat as Shivnarine Chanderpaul and Jimmy Adams began putting together what may yet prove to be the decisive stand of the match.Benefitting from the absence of Fraser, who had little left to give even when he did return after lunch, the pair added 56 runs in 24 overs before Chanderpaul wafted at Headley, returning from the Northern End after his marathon two-hour spell in the morning. However, Darryll Hair, the neutral umpire here, is the tallest on the circuit, and from his perspective the ball must have looked like it would have hit the top of the stumps.For Lara, this ground is proving a tough nut to crack as far as big scores go. Although it is home and he has the mansion on the hill, as well as a main street (Brian Lara Promenade) named after him, he still has not got the century he and his acolytes crave.Significantly, Lara's demise was the only time the Barmy Army managed to outsing the Trini Possee, a bacchanalian gathering of musicians, revellers and stunning local women, whose presence is amplified by a thunderous sound system playing all the latest Soca tunes. There is little doubt that over the years Lara will have been given the benefit of the doubt on plumber lbw's than this one, which looked if anything a little high, the ball hitting him well above the roll on his back pad. There is now a saying in these parts that Angus Fraser is as consistent as Angostura.The dismissal brought opposite reactions, and, although it was greeted by a whoop of joy from the England players, the silence from the Dos Santos and Carib Beer stands betrayed the fact that it was not the home town decision the local supporters had perhaps expected.
