West Indies won the final yesterday, set a target of 285 to win in 50 overs, they won with 4 and a half overs to spare. Lara scored a brilliant 153 (25 fours ?; run-a-ball ?), Arthurton and Simmons both had scores in the 40s; at one point, it did look as though the West Indies would win with around 10 overs to spare, but Richie Richardson and Lara slowed down a bit towards the end (till about 270, atleast :-)). The Caribbeans constantly maintained a scoring rate of between 7 to 7.5 an over, and reached 200 with slightly less than 30 overs on the board, (at the half way mark, they were 180/2).

Waqar Younus came in for a fair bit of stick, on two occasions, he was hit for 3 fours in an over, and for 2 fours in an over once. Earlier, Basit Ali scored a tremendous 127 (off 79 deliveries) and Malik contributed 84, as Pak raced to 285/4. Curtley Ambrose too came in for a hiding, giving away 63 runs in his 10 overs.

Thanks to Venky on r.s.c.

WI beat Pak in the final by 6 wickets. Pakistan made 284 for 4 which their bowling attack failed to defend. It may be tempting to speculate whether a fit Waqar, Wasim and Aaqib would have made a difference but the fact is that with talent such as Lara one never knows. He caught fire and simply won the match for the WI with a superb 150+. From what I heard from Mujtaba, Lara did not slog: he simply played superb strokes all round the wicket. For Pakistan Basit showed similar talent in hitting a 100 in 67 balls, ending with 120+ no. He had five sixes with two coming of Ambrose. One of these two sixes went clean out of the ground. A run feast, good match and rare talent on song from both sides.

Thanks to Shamim on r.s.c.

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