INJURED PLAYER BACK TO TOP FORM Lloyd pounds tourists, four 6s in century

Press, Volume CXII, Issue 32880, 1 April 1972, Page 38

INJURED PLAYER BACK TO TOP FORM Lloyd pounds tourists, four 6s in century

(From i

D. J. CAMERON.

N.Z.P.A. special correspondent)

GEORGETOWN. G. H. Lloyd, the lofty, left-handed West Indies batsman, crippled, apparently beyond repair, by a spinal injury in Australia four months ago, blazed his way back into test reckooning with a peerless 133 in Guyana’s score of 301 for three on the first day of the four-day match against New Zealand at Bourda Oval yesterday.

The West Indies selectors will meet on Sunday and on this wondrous showing they cannot hold back Lloyd any longer. The New Zealand bowlers received a pasting, one of the few days on this tour so far when someone has taken them by the scruff of the neck and almost shook the life out of them.

Besides being pounded by Lloyd’s hitting, the New Zealanders also had to concede a solid 100 not out to A. Kallicharan, the little left-hander who is regarded as one of the rising stars in West Indies cricket

Kallicharan will still be there on the resumption, and so will R. -F. Fredericks, the test opener, and the rest, so the New Zealanders might well face another of those 400-500-run chases towards respectability before they gain the haven of a draw in this game. Yet, for all the glory of Lloyd’s batting and the growing stature of Kallicharan, the New Zealanders contributed much to a splendid day of cricket

Superb fielding The pitch was another of those heartlessly hard things that the West Indies produce so often. The outfield is well-grassed and trim—tennis is played there sometimes—and the New Zealanders reacted to these conditions by even outdoing their brilliant fielding in Barbados.

G. E. Vivian had another of his glorious days in the field, B. R. Hastings was quite splendid at gully or on the fence, and by the end of the day K. O. Campbell, who had a long bowl after lunch, was. almost in the Vivian class as a stopper and thrower.

The New Zealanders sighed when B. E. Congdon lost the toss, and little wonder. They had fielded for more than two days at the end of the third test, spent nine hours getting to Guyana, arriving at 10 p.m. on the previous evening, and then had to go through the mill again today.

Kept for test R. S. Cunis, H. J. Howarth and M. G. Burgess were rested, and the New Zealanders have not yet devised a plan with which to get their manager, Mr M. E. Chapple, on to the field, for he is listed as thirteenth man. Sensibly, Congdon did not over-extend his main test

bowlers. Taylor had only three brief spells—l2 overs in afl, Congdon had only 11, and J. C. Alabaster, still feeling the effects of his ankle injury, had 19. Considering the way Alabaster troubled Lloyd, Kallicharan, and L. Baichan, he might have had double that number with some profit.

So the secondary bowlers

had much of the action. M. G. Webb had 19 overs and bowled very well, and while Lloyd and Kallicharan were charging ahead after lunch at the birth of’their 213-run stand for the third wicket, Campbell, Vivian and R. W. Morgan had most of the bowling. Campbell, especially, did well. He had 14 successive overs for 39 runs, and had Kallicharan dropped from the first and fifth balls of his first over. Fourteen consecutive overs in- the midday heat, and with. Lloyd and Kallicharan in such form, was a stem test, but Campbell did his job well and made his fine fielding later in the day all the more meritorious. Early success For a start it seemed as if New Zealand would do rather better than its present state suggested. S. Camacho, the former test opener, was dismissed by Congdon at 41, and his opening partner, Baichan, who would have made T. E. Bailey look like a dashing batsman, could only manage nine runs in the first two hours. . , Baichan was endured for eight more minutes after lunch, bringing him 10 runs in 128 minutes, before K. J. Wadsworth stumped him off Alabaster as Baichan made an uncharacteristically madcap dash down the pitch. In retrospect, the New Zealanders probably wished they had left Baichan intact, for at his rate of scoring Guyana would have struggled to reach 200 in the day. ■ _ V ’

But Baichan went, Lloyd arrived, and the fun — at least for the voluble Guyanese — began. From the start Lloyd hit very hard off the back foot, and as he settled in his stroking became even more powerful and confident. He looks usiifce the gangling young man in New Zea-

< land three years ago. The ; thick-lensed glasses, which , tended to give him a gawky • look, have been replaced l>y i contact lenses, with no vis- ; ible damage to his eyesight. I He is thicker in the torso and ; neck, and. if anything, hits I the ball even harder than he i did in New Zealand. So, with no turn or life ( in file pitch, he charged , away, hitting magnificently I off the front foot and back, i and driving majestically j straight and through cow. Lloyd hit 15 fours and four > sixes in his innings. His sixes, . amiably distributed among Webb, Taylor, Alabaster and : Morgan, were all superlative hits, especially the one off I Webb, for he took it on the i back foot and put it over the I fence at long-on. i There are other statistics > which give some measure of his power. His century came > in 128 minutes from only 107 -balls, his 133 took only 136 ■ [balls. He and Kalicharran B cored their 213-run stand in 67 minutes — the time of - Lloyd’s century. Webb was happy How Lloyd would’ have scored against less brilliant fielding is anyone’s guess, for ' there were at least nine occa- ■ sions when fierce blasts for - the fence were either cut off 1 or turned into only a single. - Kalicharran’s innings was, • naturally, in a minor key. He 1 had only nine fours in his 1 century, which came three ’ minutes before stumps in : 242 minutes and from 209 baHs. > v t He drove cleverly through ■ the covers and hooked vig--1 orously, if rather danger- ' ously, across the line. He had [ his luck immediately after • lunch when a sliced drive ■ just flicked Taylor’s outstretched hand at cover, and • when a snick was put down > by G. M. Turner at slip. f Turner made amends with ' a sharp catch off Lloyd later i in the day. The bowler was s Webb. He had been hammered and his successes on 1 tour have been few. But the t sight of Webb’s face at that - moment was worth the trip t alone. s At least one New Zea--1 lander knew a moment of 1 bliss yesterday. There will be much hard work before there ■ are others. -

GUYANA First innings S. Camacho c Wadsworth b Congdon 32 L. Baichan std Wadsworth b Alabaster 10 A. Kallicharran not out .. 100 C. H. Lloyd c Turner b Webb 133 R. F. Fredericks not out .. 7 Extras (byes 4, leg-byes 10, wide 1, no-balls 4) 19 Total for three wickets 301 Fall of wickets: one for 41, two for 65, three for 278. .

Bowling R W O M Webb .. .. 19 5 67 1 Taylor .. 12 3 27 0 Congdon .. 111 31 1 Alabaster .. *19 5 36 1 Morgan .. 8 1 39 0 Campbell .. 14 3 39 0 Vivian .. 3 0 33 0