ANTIGUA: England captain Andrew Strauss scored 169 on the opening day of the rapidly rescheduled Antigua Digicel Test, but was it proper Test cricket? On a pitch whose placidity belied its hasty preparation and the West Indies' decision to use part-time bowlers to deliver more than a third of their overs, it looked like only one team wanted this match played at the Antigua Recreation Ground, and it was not the hosts.
Strauss, who was caught and bowled by Fidel Edwards just before the close as he miscued a tired-looking pull shot, would not want to devalue a Test match hundred, but he cannot have faced a greater percentage of second-rate bowling except against Zimbabwe and Bangladesh. After seeing his team blitzed for 51 in Kingston eight days ago, this was a softly-softly approach by the West Indies that would have puzzled the Andrex puppy.
There is no doubt that England, who finished on 301-3 here on Sunday, pushed hardest for this Test to be replayed both in Antigua and as quickly as possible. The thousands of England supporters here to watch the original match at the Sir Vivian Richards Stadium deserved to see a Test of some sorts, though not many can have reckoned on seeing such friendly dispositions from both pitch and opponents.
England's batsmen took control in a manner that defied all logic regarding the 40 hours' notice given for pitch and ground preparation after Gayle won the toss and put them in. Strauss, in fine form during the tour of India but nervous in the opening Test in Kingston, was ably assisted by half-centuries from Alastair Cook and Owais Shah, the latter in his first Test innings for almost two years.
It was Strauss's second hundred as captain, though by the shout of joy which cut the air when he turned Daren Powell off his legs for two to reach it (these things can be heard at the cosy Antigua Recreation Ground), you could tell it meant much more than the other one.
Not that either team were expecting such benign conditions after rain delayed the start by 45 minutes. England had bolstered their batting by picking Graeme Swann in place of Monty Panesar while Gayle's decision to put England in must have been based on achieving early movement with the ball. A handful of overs from his fast bowlers quickly altered that view and in the 11th over he brought himself on to bowl off-spin, his early appearance surely a first for the opening day of a Test.
Less of a novelty was the hundred partnership between Strauss and Alastair Cook. This was the fifth time the pair have passed the milestone as openers, though each of the previous occasions has occurred in the past 10 months. Those who questioned the wisdom of having two left-handers as an opening pair, especially a pair with the same weakness against full-length balls outside off-stump, might have had a point a year or so ago, but not recently.
The manner of England's run-scoring would have pleased their travelling fans, many of who cut forlorn and angry figures on Friday, when the match at the SVR stadium was abandoned after just 10 balls due to a dangerous outfield. Strauss in particular was aggressive against all the West Indies bowlers, though he saved his best and biggest shots for the spinners, who found life more difficult than in the first Test at Sabina Park.
A bigger than normal cheer greeted England's openers when they passed 51, the score the team made in the second innings in Jamaica. Not long after, as the scoring rate picked up, Strauss was dropped by Gayle at slip off Sulieman Benn, a sharp chance that came quickly off the edge as Strauss, on 47 at the time, attempted to cut the left-arm spinner.
After Benn's dominance in the first Test, England had obviously decided to get after him here. After lunch, Strauss was particularly ruthless in taking him on, striking him for six back over his head and for fours just about everywhere else.
As has been his habit of late, Cook reached fifty and then got out. The tall left-hander hasn't made a Test hundred for 14 months and the dearth is clearly making him tense, which was the only explanation for his dismissal by Gayle, caught at slip cutting a ball too full for the shot.
His departure brought Owais Shah and wasted no time joining the run spree, cutting his first ball from Gayle to the cover boundary. A fine player of spin, he made a mockery of West Indies's tactics of bowling their slower bowlers, striking Benn for a six and a four.
It did not get much tougher when Gayle brought on Brendan Nash to trundle down his gentle left-arm seamers and Shah reached his fifty off 70 balls. But just as he and Strauss looked set to cut loose, Shah went into his shell scoring just seven runs in 30 balls before foolishly running himself out.
This patch of Antigua has been a batsman's nirvana ever since coming on the Test match circuit in 1981. Between then and now, it has seen both of Brian Lara's world record Test scores, the fastest Test hundred, made off 56 balls by Sir Vivian Richards, and eight centuries in the same match, a feat managed when South Africa played against West Indies here four years ago.
With two rollers, and a small army of committed workers, the Rec ground was made shipshape enough for an old-fashioned Test match. The only thing missing was the use of the fairly new umpire review system, but with bowlers unable to trouble the batsmen that often, it was not that essential.