Clark scalps five as Australia win 1st Test against West Indies
Stuart Clarke took a career-best 5-32 to help Australia win the first cricket Test against West Indies by 95 runs and go 1-0 up in the best-of-three contest.
Chasing a target of 287 on the final day at Jamaica’s Sabina Park, the home team was bowled out for 191 shortly before the tea interval after resuming at 46-1. Clark and fellow paceman Brett Lee took six of the nine wickets to fall today.
Clark’s best Test performance lifted Australia to its 13th win in the past 14 elite five-day matches against West Indies. The top-ranked Australians are seeking their ninth straight Test series win. The second match starts May 30 in Antigua.
“Stuart Clark and Brett Lee led the way outstandingly well to really set the game up for us,” Australia captain Ricky Ponting said at the presentation ceremony. “It was a terrific Test and we’ve just come out on top.”
Clark, 32, was named man of the match for his overall figures of 8-91 in 39 overs, which lifted his career tally to 75 wickets in 16 Tests at an average of 20.77.
West Indies, which hasn’t won a Test series since beating bottom-ranked Bangladesh in 2004, had needed another 241 runs on the final day to inflict Australia’s first loss in a series- opening match in almost 9 years.
The Caribbean team slumped to 117-6 at lunch after Clark and Lee shared five wickets in the morning session.
Denesh Ramdin and Darren Sammy rallied the home team with a 67-run partnership before Stuart MacGill ran out Ramdin with a direct hit. Leg-spinner MacGill then took two of the final three wickets to fall to help wrap up the win.
West Indies selectors included captain Chris Gayle and fast bowler Jerome Taylor in a 14-man squad for the second Test. Opening batsman Gayle missed the opener because of a groin injury, while Taylor has recovered from a sore back. Amit Jaggernauth and all-rounder Ryan Hinds were dropped.
Australia last lost a Test series in the Caribbean in 1991.
“We’ve got to be positive, obviously we’ve got a lot to take from this match,” Ramnaresh Sarwan, who was deputizing as captain for Gayle, said at the presentation.
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