The bricks are in place

It was also a time when the West Indies, then led by Gary Sobers, had thrashed England 3-1 at home and also had a more settled, if perhaps less balanced, side: Wes Hall and Charlie Griffith, Seymour Nurse and Lance Gibbs. Some of the counties were miffed at how Sobers treated their games as practice matches, a touch avant garde perhaps, but that was Sobers for you. It was an era before Clive Lloyd took over and the fast bowling machine earned an enviable reputation as even the Aussies quaked.

Fast-forwarding to the new century, the Windies have been through the mangle and were almost forced to share the Test series in Zimbabwe 1-1. That was a fair enough indication that Brian Lara, in his second tenure as captain, was leading a side struggling with an under-powered bowling attack and a laidback attitude in training and fielding methods.

What was noticeable was the change in Lara’s method of leadership from the almost cavalier approach of 1998/99, where tried to lead from the front and failed. He is now more studious and thoughtful and, while his field placings and tactics rarely won the on-field battle, he was at least more organised in his thinking. He also drew confidence from lessons being learnt on the sharp-edged rock face of this tour.

Injuries also did much to disturb the plans to build a side and move forward from the Zimbabwe experience. Marlon Samuels and Omari Banks were two early, disruptive departures and their replacements, while willing, were hardly up to it. Chris Gayle’s hamstring injury in the first Test at The Wanderers added an extra furrow to the team management frown. Not once, though, did Lara refer to the crippling problems facing the tourists; not until the fourth ODI at SuperSport Park in Centurion.

Graeme Smith, meanwhile, mumbled about fatigue and tired players and not quite getting the ball in the right area as reasons for that heavy defeat. Really. Offering feeble excuses when words of congratulations for a great victory for the tourists would have shown a better understanding of the situation and team shortcomings.

Smith’s team, while showing signs of being a more settled side than it was 12 months before, still had make-up hassles at Test level and faced media sniping at selection policy as the middle-order was groping to accommodate four batsmen for three positions. What may have created some uncertainty in the ranks is how the Saf selectors clung to Gary Kirsten as if he was going to be the foundation on which imposing totals would be scored against the Windies.

For a team in transition and against opposition as weak as the Windies, it might have been the ideal series to ease Kirsten out and settle Martin van Jaarsveld in at three and build his confidence as well as that of the team. After all Kallis, in the new-found role at four, scored six centuries and 1,073 runs in 11 innings.

What Rahul Dravid has done for India in Australia, Kallis did for the Safs at home and at a time when the locals needed a hero to fete. Even the thousands who were disenchanted after the early exit from World Cup 2003 had their interest rekindled.

At this stage Omar Henry’s selection panel still seem uncertain of what forward direction they want to take the side. Surely New Zealand would have presented that challenge. Rather now than, say, Sri Lanka and India, where the challenges are going to be much tougher. For the West Indies, the names Ravi Rampaul and Fidel Edwards emerged as bowlers to watch and the Caribbean tour by England will indicate just how far they have come.

Apart from the Kallis run-machine and Lance Klusener getting the sort of receptions not even Hansie Cronje would have received, the memory of the tour for the Windies could be summed up in that one over at The Wanderers that Rampaul bowled to Kallis and took his wicket: it is still the game that is done, but never done.