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Miller time Spinner fires Australia towards 13th straight win
Updated: Monday December 18, 2000 6:09 AM
ADELAIDE, Australia (Reuters) -- Australia was on the verge of victory over West Indies on Monday after 15 wickets tumbled during the fourth day of the third test. At the close Australia was 98 for four in its second innings, needing only 32 more runs to reach its victory target of 130 and clinch the series. Australia, which won the first two matches of the five-game series to set a world record of 12 consecutive test wins, put itself in a position to make it 13 in a row when it destroyed the West Indian second innings for just 141. But not everything had gone Australia's way. It was restricted to a first innings lead of just 12 when it failed to add to its overnight score of 403-9 then suddenly found itself on the receiving end of another Brian Lara onslaught. Following on from his double century against Australia A last week and his first innings 182, Lara was again in brilliant touch, smashing four fours and six to race to 39 at better than a run a ball. With runs hard to come by and the wicket starting to turn at alarming angles, Lara belted leg spinner Stuart MacGill out of the attack by taking 20 runs off one over before off-spinner Colin Miller deceived him, found an inside edge and Langer took the simplest of catches at bat pad. Even then, with just 130 required for victory, Australia again found itself under pressure, slumping to 48-4 before Justin Langer (43 not out) and Damien Martyn (18 not out) rescued the innings with an unbroken half-century partnership. Unlikely hero Miller, 36, was Australia's unlikely hero, capturing 10 wickets in a test for the first time in his career. He added 5-32 to his first innings haul of 5-81 and claimed Lara's wicket for the second time in the match. "We knew Lara was always going to be a key," said Miller. "He does score quickly no matter who is bowling to him so to pick him up early as we did in that second innings was probably the turning point for us." Lara's departure triggered another embarrassing West Indies collapse and it lost its last eight wickets for just 54 runs. Miller, a late bloomer who made his test debut in 1998 at age 34, claimed the 50th wicket of his brief international career when he dismissed Daren Ganga shortly after Lara left. Ganga had been at the center of a row before lunch when he was controversially given not out by Srinivas Venkataraghavan after wicketkeeper and captain Adam Gilchrist had claimed a catch. Relations strained The Australians had little doubt that Ganga was out and were already celebrating his dismissal when the Indian umpire shook his head to signal the batsman was not out, although television replays later showed there was a clear deflection. With relations between the two teams already strained after MacGill was warned by English match referee Alan Smith for barging into substitute Ramnaresh Sarwan on Sunday, tempers began to fray. Ganga exchanged words with some of the fielders and Lara marched down the pitch to get involved before the umpires stepped in to restore calm. "I thought we had a wicket and Venkat didn't think we had a wicket so that was basically it," said Miller. "Not a lot was really said between the players, just the normal banter that goes on when a team thinks they've had a batsman out." Ganga was 30 at the time and made only two more after he returned from lunch when Miller trapped him lbw and Venkataraghavan raised his finger. Captain Jimmy Adams made 15 and paceman Mervyn Dillon 19 to take the total past 100 before Miller and Glenn McGrath (3-27) cleaned up the tail by tea to send Australia into bat for the second time on the day. Australia had started the day at 403-9 in its first innings, 12 in front of West Indies' 391, but failed to add to its overnight score as Dillon sent the fourth ball of the day crashing into McGrath's stumps to finish with figures of 3-84. Its fortunes did not improve when it returned to the crease in the final session. Dillon dismissed Michael Slater (one) and Mark Waugh (five) in his first spell to give himself 10 wickets for the series. Then world record holder Courtney Walsh sent Matthew Hayden (14) and Ricky Ponting (11) packing to move within 10 of becoming the first player to reach 500 test wickets. West Indies was beaten by an innings inside three days in the two previous tests and suddenly found itself in the game. But its hopes of winning this match to keep the series alive were effectively extinguished over the next 90 minutes as Langer and Martyn edged Australia closer to victory.
Copyright 2003 Reuters Limited. All rights reserved.
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