All posts by csb10.top

ScorecardMandeep Singh: “”I think Mumbai lost the plot with their fielding. They gave me three chances yesterday, and I could ensure it cost them dearly.”•Fotocorp

Mandeep Singh made the most of the three catches Mumbai dropped on the first evening to score a century, and he converted it into his maiden double on the second day at the Wankhede Stadium. Riding on Mandeep’s 211, and his 195-run partnership for the fifth wicket with the aggressive Amitoze Singh, Punjab amassed 580.In reply, Mumbai openers Kaustubh Pawar and Aditya Tare started positively, before Tare offered a return catch to Manpreet Gony, the leader of Punjab’s pace attack. Pawar was dropped by Mandeep at slip off Harbhajan Singh, and Ajinkya Rahane was bowled off a no-ball from Sandeep Sharma before he had scored. They then survived until stumps, with Mumbai on 69 for 1.The last hour had plenty of action, but the day’s highlight was in the first session. Mandeep, who had switched to a higher gear in the last session of the opening day, continued in the same way after resuming on 102. And Amitoze, who took guard after Punjab had lost Uday Kaul off the last ball of the previous day, lived up to his aggressive tag by targeting all the Mumbai bowlers.If Mumbai were to have any hope of restricting to Punjab around 400, early wickets were essential. But once Mandeep and Amitoze, who is familiar with conditions at the Wankhede having been part of the Mumbai Indians set-up, added 36 in the first five overs, those hopes grew bleak.When the fast bowlers pitched the ball up, it was driven with comfort; when they pitched short, it was pulled, by Mandeep in particular; when the spinners were introduced to control the scoring, the move backfired. Amitoze was especially severe on offspinner Ramesh Powar, who had four wickets in as many games this season. He hit Powar into the stands on either side of the sightscreen. Powar’s figures in the first session were 5-0-50-0; Punjab scored 163 runs in 31.2 over and were 451 for 4 at lunch.Mumbai seemed to change their plans after the break. Dhawal Kulkarni started to test Mandeep’s strength by pitching it short with two men behind square on the leg side, and Ankeet Chavan began bowling over the wicket in order to restrict the run-flow.That too was of no avail, initially. Mandeep bisected deep square leg and deep fine leg twice in succession in the first over of the session, he reverse swept Chavan in the next for the same results. Mandeep, who had failed to contribute in Punjab’s first five games, then entered the 190s with an upper cut off Kulkarni.Amitoze, meanwhile, closed in on what could have been his second first-class century with a six off Chavan over long-on. But it was not to be. The next ball, he tried to sweep Chavan, top-edged it and Kulkarni did the rest at deep square leg. The 195-run partnership, which came off just 217 deliveries in less than three hours, had put Punjab in the driver’s seat.Mandeep, on 193, survived some anxious moments as he repeatedly failed to connect his reverse-sweeps off Chavan, who was bowling outside leg stump with a packed on-side field. He brought up his double-century when Pawar dropped a catch off Ajit Agarkar. Mandeep was on 199 when he had his fourth reprieve. He hardly celebrated, though, because he had celebrated earlier, when the scoreboard operator had shown him on 200 when he was a run short.Chavan was eventually rewarded for his relentless effort when Mandeep shouldered arms to a ball that crashed into off stump. Though the dismissal triggered a mini-collapse as Punjab lost three wickets for two runs, the damage had already been done. And the last two wickets added another 66 runs.”I think Mumbai lost the plot with their fielding. They gave me three chances yesterday, and I could ensure it cost them dearly,” Mandeep, who bettered his previous first-class best of 193 for India A in New Zealand earlier in the year, said. “Had they caught one of those catches last evening, perhaps they would have been able to pull things back by picking another couple of wickets. I have realised the importance of scoring big hundreds and the last two or three times, have been able to convert hundreds into big ones. Let’s hope I carry on in the same vein.”

ScorecardWes Durston made 84 but Derbyshire could still be asked to follow on•Getty Images

After a summer disrupted by rain, Yorkshire can plead mitigating factors if they fail in their main objective and are unable to secure promotion from Division Two. They may also reflect on chances missed if they are unable to force home their advantage against Derbyshire, one of their main rivals, during another weather-interrupted day.Trailing Derbyshire, the Division two leaders, by 26 points at the start of this round of matches having played a game more, Yorkshire were always aware they would need to beat them at Headingley to have any chance of closing the gap and applying pressure during the final weeks of the summer.For the first two and a half days of a rain-affected match they had done nearly everything right in claiming maximum batting points while limiting Derbyshire to only one bowling point. They followed that by making early inroads, with Ryan Sidebottom’s outstanding display of swing bowling reducing them to 42 for 4, still a long way from matching Yorkshire’s 420, never mind avoiding the follow on.Facing a real opportunity to dominate a session that could have been pivotal to their promotion hopes, Yorkshire allowed Derbyshire to recover with Will Durston and Ross Whiteley forging a 112-run stand.Their defiance allowed the leaders to reach a respectable 233 for 8, but only after losing two late wickets at the end of a day that lost 24 overs to rain, still 38 runs away from avoiding the follow on.”We’ve performed really well since the start of the game, we’ve probably won more sessions and more key periods, but it counts for nothing if we don’t enforce that follow on,” conceded Andrew Gale, Yorkshire’s captain. “At the moment, it’s probably the only way I can see us winning the match.”If there was a sense of deflation within the home dressing room, it was understandable after a vibrant start to the day, led by Sidebottom, which gave Yorkshire a real chance of their first championship victory since May. Bowling from the Rugby Stand End, Sidebottom gave an exemplary display of swing bowling and provided another platform for Andrew Hodd, Yorkshire’s loan wicketkeeper, to prove his worth for a permanent contract.Hodd, who scored a useful 58 on the previous day to help Yorkshire claim maximum batting points, set down a marker in the fourth over of the day with a brilliant, one-handed, diving catch down the leg-side after Usman Khawaja flicked at Sidebottom. Having established his athleticism, Hodd helped earn Sidebottom two further wickets during a spell of 7-3-9-2 by taking catches in front of slip to remove Matt Lineker and Dan Redfern.While Sidebottom was impressive at the Rugby Stand End and Azeem Rafiq’s offspin a consistent threat from the opposite end, Yorkshire appeared to have all the tools at their disposal to really push home their advantage. That they failed to do so can partly be explained by the frustration experienced by Tim Bresnan and Steve Patterson, both of whom struggled to exploit the conditions as expertly as Sidebottom.Confidence lifted by his five wickets in Yorkshire’s first innings, Durston was happy to play aggressively and hit 14 boundaries in his 84 although he was given one reprieve on 78 when Adam Lyth failed to hold a sharp chance at slip off Rafiq. That escape was only temporary with Rafiq squeezing the ball past his forward defensive in his next over and onto the stumps.Whiteley was equally effective, batting for over two and a half hours for his 35, before Patterson squeezed some joy from an otherwise demoralising day when he induced an edge behind to earn Hodd his fourth catch. Forced to rely on spin through fading light, Gale was rewarded in the last few overs with Rafiq and Adil Rashid both winning lbw decisions to keep Yorkshire’s hopes alive of forcing home victory on the final day.The main obstacle to that objective may yet be David Wainwright, the left-arm spinner they considered surplus to resources at the end of last summer, who has battled for nearly two hours for his unbeaten 45 and may play a key role in deciding his former county’s fate.

Scorecard and ball-by-ball detailsStuart Broad’s burst during the afternoon preceded a South Africa declaration setting England 253 to win•Getty Images

A Headingley Test that had been marked throughout by cautious, disciplined cricket in morose weather ended with an unexpected and deeply uncomfortable England run chase as South Africa’s captain, Graeme Smith, with the happy daring of a man who had recently witnessed the birth of his first child, set them 253 from 39 overs to level the series at 1-1 with one to play.England’s chase, which turned abruptly into a battle for survival at 106 for 4 with 19.2 overs remaining, was cagey but not entirely artificial as they responded in kind. Kevin Pietersen accepted the role of gung-ho opener – the first time he had opened for England in Test cricket – and struck three boundaries off Morne Morkel’s first over before he spliced to mid-on. Matt Prior also came in at No. 5 shortly before England reached the final hour with 154 needed off 20. Then Prior was run out by Smith, of all people, from behind square as Jonathan Trott procrastinated over a second run.The presence of Andrew Strauss and Trott in the top four summed up the double think in England’s batting order; both would have been better reserved for calamity. It was a run chase England were obliged to flirt with, having lost the first Test in the series, but knew that the odds were they would end up blocking out.Smith then, with the game safe, delayed a while before he dared to attack in force and called things off at 130 for 4 with six overs remaining – the equivalent of two sessions lost to rain had had the final say. The pressures of Test captaincy hang heavily. But both sides deserve credit for dicing with danger and both will claim a psychological advantage. What is beyond debate is that we have two sides entering the final Test at Lord’s with appetites whetted. Why, oh why, is this a three-Test series?If Pietersen’s exhilarating century on the third day had first brought the Test alive, it was a more improbable achievement – three South Africa wickets on either side of lunch – that enlivened it again. But his biggest impact came after the match as he warned that his stand-off with the ECB was on the verge of bringing his England career to an end.It certainly revitalised Stuart Broad, who is looking more and more a mood player these days, and who responded to a shift in the game with a five-wicket spell broken by tea, including a rush of four wickets in 20 balls as the sun broke through and an excellent Headingley pitch finally began to show signs of wear.Broad, bowling full and straight, removed AB de Villiers, who had played regally for 44 from 45 balls, and JP Duminy with successive deliveries. Duminy got his feet in a tangle as he was dismissed first ball; Vernon Philander soon followed.Then as tea approached, Broad made it four as he banged the ball in short at Jacques Kallis and brushed his glove to claim a wicketkeeper’s catch as Kallis limbo danced in self-preservation. Alviro Petersen was also pressed into service despite a damaged hamstring that prevented him running with comfort. His last wicket, a slog by Morkel, was followed by Smith’s declaration. And until recently his captaincy was held to be ultra conservative.South Africa had begun the final day with a lead of 33 and crucially their opening pair survived until the last over before lunch, at which point, frustratingly for Jacques Rudolph, he was again immediately overcome by Pietersen’s lightly regarded offspin. Pietersen had Rudolph stumped in his first over on the second day, and this time he had him lbw in his first over on the final day. On both occasions, the ball turned sharply.Rudolph, the more skittish of the pair, released a few neat off-side drives but never looking content against the short ball. Several deliveries, against Anderson in particular, scudded through the slips, and he also took another blow on the shoulder as a short ball from Anderson forced him into evasive action.As Pietersen assembled his best Test figures, Graeme Swann, whose offspin was omitted as England opted for an all-pace attack, was preparing to join Nottinghamshire for a Championship match at Taunton. The conclusion that England had erred in selection could not easily be avoided – although Pietersen’s final wicket, a loopy full toss which Hashim Amla drilled to short extra, hardly ranked as evidence.Pietersen also uprooted Smith, whose battling half-century, which was reached from the last ball of a morning session, extended to two-and-a-half hours and was interrupted by two rain stoppages, had made Headingley’s first draw in 13 Tests all but inevitable.Pietersen had thought he had Smith caught at the wicket only to waste a DRS appeal finding out he hadn’t. But Smith fell in Pietersen’s next over, this time the South Africa captain failing with a review after an ungainly sweep was caught by James Taylor at short leg. Umpire Steve Davis was perhaps fortunate that the TV umpire, Asad Rauf, did not overturn his decision.Smith looked embattled. The look suited him, as it always does. It was a grouchy morning, with showers scudding across the outfield at regular intervals, his knee was strapped to try to combat a dicey cartilage and he had a Test match to save. As events subsequently suggested, it was not as straightforward as many supposed.Smith had a let-off in the penultimate over before lunch when he edged Tim Bresnan, but was dropped one-handed by Anderson, diving to his right at second slip. Anderson later waved past de Villers’ edge against Pietersen. He is England’s best slip fielder, but there is a malaise at present in their close catching.That escape apart, Smith was in his element. He has built a formidable Test record – more than 8,000 runs at an average over 50 – by grimacing and deflecting, working the leg side with an angled blade and putting his considerable bulk on the line to great effect. His record against England is a special one.For all his inelegance, he is a special breed of cricketer. He defended his wicket with the resolve and physical presence of a Greco-Roman wrestler imagining he was fighting himself.England attacked him predictably, with their routine two-slips-and-a-gully and run savers on the leg side. With quick wickets imperative, on this occasion at least, the lack of a leg-side catcher verged on the negligent. But England are committed to their disciplines and by the time they played fast and loose with Pietersen and Broad it was too late.

Mahela Jayawardene, the Sri Lanka captain, has praised his bowlers for dismissing Pakistan in tough conditions in Galle, and said he did not enforce the follow-on despite a 372-run lead because he wanted to give them a break.”You always think that you can take those remaining wickets and finish it off. But they [Pakistan] batted really well,” Jayawardene said after Sri Lanka’s 209-run win. “We had to be patient until we got those opportunities. It was a great effort from the bowlers. Tough conditions but we stuck to our task and executed the plans we set up when the Test match started.”Sri Lanka chose to bat again after Pakistan were dismissed for 100 on the third day and Jayawardene said that was because the pitch was still good for batting. “Our guys had already bowled 60 overs in the first innings. If I had inserted the follow-on, they would have had to bowl another three or four sessions. Whether I would get the same effort was questionable.”Guys like [Nuwan] Kulasekara, who had played five-six ODIs straight, had to be given a break,” Jayawardene said. “We had only played two and half days on that wicket, so it was better for our batsmen to bat again on a wicket easier to bat on, and thereby bat Pakistan out of the game.”The bowlers obliged yesterday evening by picking up three wickets. We knew it was going to be a tough day and we had to think of a lot of things. The easiest thing to do was insert the follow-on but we had to think of a lot of things and all those things came into the equation.”Jayawardene said there were several positives that Sri Lanka could take out of the game for the next Test. “The batting looked much better. We had a good start. [Tillakaratne] Dilshan went onto get a hundred. When he gets hundreds he puts us in good positions because he scores quickly,” he said. “Kumar [Sangakkara] got us a big hundred. [Tharanga] Paranavitana got a start and got out, and that’s another plus. We were struggling to get those starts going.”I thought Suraj [Randiv] bowled much better in this game than he did against England and he has got lot of confidence. Kulasekara [was] coming back into the side, [he] showed what a quality bowler he is.”Looking ahead to the next two Tests, Jayawardene said, “We have to be positive. We have two matches to go. We need to put this match behind and keep improving. We need to focus on that and try and be a lot more consistent with bowling, batting and fielding.”

ScorecardJames Taylor also scored a hundred for England Lions this season•Getty Images

England hopefuls James Taylor and Samit Patel played key roles as Nottinghamshire recorded their first Clydesdale Bank 40 win of the season with a narrow 14-run victory over Hampshire.With Kevin Pietersen announcing his retirement from all limited-overs international cricket the pair sent a timely reminder to the England selectors of their abundant talent. Taylor struck a magnificent unbeaten 115, a record for a Nottinghamshire batsmen against Hampshire in List A cricket. Patel, meanwhile, scored 66, his first one-day half-century of the season, and took three crucial Royals wickets.It was the diminutive Taylor who really caught the eye, though, with a scintillating career-best innings that came off just 77 balls and included seven sixes and seven fours.With Nottinghamshire having meandered along to 147 for 4 off 30 overs after winning the toss and electing to bat, Taylor, the England Lions captain, sparked his side’s innings into life as he smashed 90 runs in his final 32 balls. He shared an unbeaten 143-run stand for the fifth wicket with Adam Voges.No-one in the crowd was safe as Taylor unfurled some inventive strokes with Sean Ervine, Danny Briggs and Chris Wood taking the brunt of the punishment.Earlier things had looked much rosier for the home side after Michael Lumb (0) and Rikki Wessels (18) were dismissed cheaply before Patel, whose 66 came off 75 balls, and Taylor smashed Notts to their final total.Hampshire, though, were never out of the contest as skipper Jimmy Adams (51) and Michael Carberry (54), the competition’s top runs scorer, got the home side off to a flyer scoring 88 inside the first 10 overs.Patel’s introduction swung the game back in the visitors favour. In three consecutive overs he removed Adams, caught well by Taylor at mid-wicket, James Vince, caught by Voges, and Simon Katich, leg before for five.But Hampshire refused to throw in the towel, thanks to excellent innings from Ervine and Dimitri Mascarenhas. Ervine, seemingly looking to atone for his earlier bowling spell, kept the run rate at a manageable level with a run-a-ball 60, that included six fours.Again Hampshire cause looked lost when Ervine was caught by Andy Carter at short fine-leg off Paul Franks but Mascarenhas reignited the contest striking two sixes off Carter in the 37th over.Requiring 15 off the final over, however, Hampshire’s luck ran out as Pattinson (3 for 66) mopped up the final two wickets with Mascarenhas the last to fall for 48.

Match facts

Sunday, April 29, Delhi
Start time 1600 (1030 GMT)Shahbaz Nadeem made another big contribution against Mumbai Indians•AFP

Big Picture

After an encouraging start to the tournament where they had four wins out of six, Rajasthan Royals have lost their last two matches and slipped to fifth position. Their next challenge is likely to be their toughest – facing Delhi Daredevils in Delhi – as the mid-table scramble heats up.Daredevils, meanwhile, stamped their authority with a thumping win over Mumbai Indians on Friday which has taken them a step ahead of the rest. It was the first time this season that Daredevils batted first and they made most of their muscle by posting 207. While Kevin Pietersen has had a Gayle-like effect on the team, Virender Sehwag has bullied the opposition with three consecutive half-centuries at a strike-rate of 182.35. Sehwag now has the orange cap in his sights. Daredevils’ pacers – purple cap holder Morne Morkel, Umesh Yadav and Irfan Pathan – have played in all eight games. With Varun Aaron, who will be available soon, Andre Russell and Doug Bracewell on the bench, there is a case for rotation.Royals have adequate strength in their batting to counter pace and spin. Rahane has been confident, while Owais Shah and Brad Hodge can attack faster bowlers with ease. In Brad Hogg, Royals have a canny spinner, who can entice Sehwag into a trap. But the small boundaries and a flat pitch in Delhi could turn this game into another bat-out.

Form guide

(most recent first)
Delhi Daredevils: WWLWW
Rajasthan Royals: LLWWL

Players to watch

Mahela Jayawadene joined the party with an attractive 55 in the last game, leading the counter-attack in the face of some penetrative bowling by Lasith Malinga. Royals’ bowling is slightly weaker, which could just be the invitation for Jayawardene to possibly match Sehwag.Owais Shah has been the engine whenever acceleration is required for Royals. He has scored 278 runs at a strike-rate of 147.08 and has struck 15 sixes, one more than even Sehwag has managed.

Stats and trivia

• Hodge with 4365 runs and Shah with 3835 are the second and third most prolific batsmen in Twenty20 cricket.
• Pietersen may be the joint leader for sixes – 19 in all – in this IPL but Sehwag can reach a century of sixes in Twenty20 cricket in this match. He is on 99.
• Shaun Tait is close to a landmark as well, but he hasn’t been part of the playing XI for Royals this season. He is currently on 97 Twenty20 wickets.
• Daredevils have played the Royals twice at the Kotla. They have won both games.
  

  Quotes

  “It will be a healthy headache for the team management.”

  “The bowling in death overs is still a big worry for us.”

Complaining about the weather is not becoming of athletes. After all, they choose to play sport for a living so they should be willing to put up with conditions that are occasionally less than pleasant. Today, though, nobody would have blamed any of the New Zealand players for moaning about the weather.They had to field under heavily pregnant skies with tufts of drizzle blowing in intermittently. Worse than that, a wind of up to 80kph lashed the Basin Reserve, blowing the flags off their poles, the seagulls off their perches and the bowlers off their delivery strides. Regularly.”Out of the 460 odd days of Test cricket I have played, this ranks somewhere near the bottom,” Daniel Vettori said with a wry smile when asked to assess the day. “It was an incredibly tough day in terms of the conditions. Just not easy for the bowlers.”From the stands, or on television, one cannot judge just how difficult it is to deal with wind. “For the fast bowlers bowling with the wind behind them, it’s just about settling in and getting used to having it on your back,” Vettori said. “But into the wind it’s pretty tough for the seamers and even for the spinners. You get blown around in your run-up and in your delivery stride, and it can be a little difficult.”Mark Gillespie and Kane Williamson had the most notable difficulty with their run-ups, having to restart a few times, but all the bowlers struggled.Vettori did not use the conditions as an excuse for New Zealand’s performance, though, which saw them bowl 37 overs on the second day without taking a wicket, miss the two chances that were created from the edge of Alviro Petersen’s bat and allow Petersen and JP Duminy to get on top of them. That came on the back of an ordinary first day, on which New Zealand managed to take only two wickets after putting the opposition in. Vettori said they were willing to front up to the fact that they had not done enough despite the two truncated days of cricket.”We were pretty disappointed after winning the toss and that first session [on Friday]. We probably fought back a little bit with the big wicket of [Hashim] Amla but the sort of stop-start nature of today and not knowing what we were doing also did not help.”We were a bit shocked to be starting at 2pm as well. The start of today wasn’t as successful as we wanted because we needed an early breakthrough this afternoon. Overall we are disappointed in only taking two wickets on a wicket that offered some assistance early on.”JP Duminy was less critical in his appraisal of the conditions, rating the day “about a seven,” as far as conditions go. Although the wind has a less hostile effect on batsmen, it did require Duminy to make certain adjustments. “I spread my feet a little bit more to get a good centre base,” he said. “It was difficult at times facing bowlers coming into the wind; if they pitched the ball up it sort of wobbled a bit. I tried to play as straight as possible. The other trouble is maybe the bat wobbling in the air during your backlift, so I held it a bit firmer to make sure I had control.”Duminy’s adjustment to the conditions was accompanied by an adjustment to the format, as he has not played Test cricket in more than two years. He finished the day unbeaten on 76 and has shown every intent of hanging around for long. “It’s a decent deck to bat on and there’s a little bit there for the bowlers as well,” he said.Vettori said he expected there to still be something in the track for the bowlers on the third day. “It’s still got some pace in it but it depends on the conditions tomorrow. That’s always the key in Wellington; overhead conditions play a big part,” he said. “Sometimes the best days are when it’s a big blue sky and the ball can swing here.”Clear weather and sunshine is predicted for the rest of the match and Vettori said he hoped New Zealand could make the most of it. “Wickets can fall in clumps here, so that’s our goal tomorrow morning. If the conditions hold out and it’s a better bowling day we need to attack pretty earlier on.”Edited by Dustin Silgardo

Scorecard and ball-by-ball detailsShivnarine Chanderpaul scored his 25th Test ton•AFP

Shivnarine Chanderpaul not only has one of the longest names in world cricket but also one of the longest attention spans. The Australians know this because four years ago in the Caribbean he averaged more than four hours per innings against them. Little has changed. Chanderpaul’s six-hour unbeaten century in the first Test in Barbados has given West Indies the upper hand against Australia, although they must hope the time their batsmen used won’t cost them later in the game.The dour West Indian display ended late in the afternoon when Darren Sammy declared, a rare privilege during his tenure as Test captain, at 449 for 9. It was the first time West Indies had ever had all 11 batsmen reach double figures in a Test innings, although they did so at a run rate of less than three an over. Australia’s openers survived until stumps and were 44 for 0, with David Warner on 27 and Ed Cowan on 13, and much work lay ahead for the visitors.It is unlikely that men such as Warner, Shane Watson and Ricky Ponting will trickle along slowly on a good batting pitch, but they would be wise to exercise at least some of the caution shown by the likes of Chanderpaul, Kraigg Brathwaite and Darren Bravo over the past two days. At times the West Indies innings threatened to stagnate, but it wasn’t dormant for too long at a time.Sammy himself made sure of that with a highly entertaining 41 from 36 balls. He batted just like he had during the limited-overs games last month and did not resist his naturally attacking urges. But there was aggression from both sides during a fascinating period in which Sammy was clearly shaken by a Watson bouncer that struck him on the back of the helmet as he ducked and turned his head.Sammy’s response was to launch the next ball from Watson high and straight back over his head for six, to the cheers of the West Indian fans. But in what was perhaps a delayed reaction, Sammy appeared to be struggling at the end of the over when he received attention from the team doctor, and it took a few minutes for him to decide that he would bat on.Earlier, Sammy had shown his intent with three powerful fours off the offspin of Nathan Lyon and after his blow to the head nothing changed. He pulled Watson for another six reminiscent of some of the strokes he played in the ODIs and cleared the cow corner boundary off Ben Hilfenhaus, who eventually removed him when Sammy top-edged an attempted pull to deep midwicket.Chanderpaul had scored only eight during his 53-run partnership with Sammy but that was hardly surprising, for he is not the type to get caught up in the moment. He scored his runs with typically Chanderpaulesque nudges, clips and prods, although he also showed a willingness to attack when the opportunity arose and lofted Nathan Lyon’s offspin down the ground for six.Along the way, Chanderpaul moved past Brian Lara to become the highest Test run scorer at Kensington Oval, and at length his century arrived with a swivel pull for two from his 235th delivery. With that stroke, he moved past Viv Richards into outright third on the list of all-time West Indies Test centurions with his 25th hundred.Chanderpaul had been in the nineties when the No.11 Devendra Bishoo came to the crease and although he didn’t hurry to triple figures, he had no need to thanks to the ample support he received. Bishoo finished not out on 18 and Chanderpaul had 103 when the declaration arrived, as the Australian bowlers struggled to string wickets together.They managed only two after tea, Kemar Roach caught at slip off Lyon for 16 and Fidel Edwards caught at long-on for 10 when he pulled David Warner’s legspin. Two wickets had also fallen in the middle session of the day, the loss of Sammy preceded by the run-out of Carlton Baugh for 22. Baugh took off for a single when Chanderpaul turned a ball from Lyon behind square leg and was caught short by Ryan Harris’ direct hit when sent back by Chanderpaul.That ended a 31-run stand that had nearly been stifled in its first few deliveries when Ricky Ponting at slip dropped a tough chance when Baugh was on 4. The run-out was a bonus for the Australians, who used eight bowlers in a Test innings for the first time since the Delhi Test against India in 2008, as they sought a way through the gritty West Indian batting order.During the first session, Chanderpaul lost two partners, Darren Bravo for 51 and Narsingh Deonarine for 21. Bravo and Chanderpaul had compiled a 73-run partnership before the breakthrough eventually arrived when Bravo drove on the up and edged Watson to gully. It was no surprise that Bravo fell to an edge; he had brought up his half-century with an edge wide of slip off Peter Siddle from his 114th delivery and had slashed a streaky boundary over gully the previous ball.Australia followed with the wicket of Deonarine, who tried to work a shortish ball from Ryan Harris down into the ground and behind square leg but succeeded only in top-edging a catch for the wicketkeeper Matthew Wade. Fortunately for West Indies, another Guyanese left-hander was able to stick around for much longer.