Hick's savagery brings hope

Second Test: Thorpe injury gives cause for concern but England's batsmen hit back with their own brand of firepower

THIS has been an enthralling cricket match. It is quite usual in Test matches to know precisely where the match honours are heading by the end of the third day. Not with this game. In recent years, the England dressing-room has rarely been awash with bubbly, this Lord's Test, with its twists and turns and equally unpredictable pitch, may yet conquer England's bogey at HQ.

A thrillingly savage 67 by Graeme Hick, coming after an equally expansive cameo by Alec Stewart, now thankfully restored as an opener, helped England to a 114-run lead by close yeserday. But this came only after a battling 75 by Keith Arthurton and some some penetrative bowling by Courtney Walsh had threatened to take the game clean out of England's grasp. Nevertheless, the home team's position is no more than promising, especially as Graham Thorpe was forced to retire having been struck on the head first ball by a Walsh beamer not long after the gangly Jamaican had removed both openers.

Walsh, bowling as ever with great guile, varying both his pace and angle, tried to bowl a slower ball yorker. Instead, the ball arrived as a head- high full toss that struck Thorpe a heavy blow. Clearly groggy, he was taken off for an X-ray at nearby St Mary's hospital, where he spent a precautionary night once concussion was diagnosed. Thorpe's doctor and a neurologist will decide this morning whether he can bat today. The England physiotherapist, Dave Roberts, reported: "He really couldn't remember anything, and I wanted to take him off as soon as possible."

Walsh is as genial a man as you could wish to meet off the cricket field, but his working-over of Devon Malcolm in the West Indies showed a hardened streak that surprised many onlookers. The delivery that hit Thorpe was illegal (anything above waist high failing to pitch is called a no-ball) but it was not intentional, though it may be difficult for those who admire Walsh's normally excellent control to swallow that particular argument.

Faced with a 41-run shortfall, England took just over nine overs to knock off the deficit as Stewart drove and hooked anything loose, which isn't much where Walsh and Ambrose are concerned. At 32, he lost Atherton, caught down the leg-side by Murray off Walsh, the rising delivery touching a glove as the batsman tried to ride the steep bounce. This seemed to catalyse Stewart into a flurry of boundaries until he, too, fell in almost identical fashion to the same combination.

Hick was then roughed up by a flurry of bouncers from Walsh, but like his delivery to Thorpe, it was an experiment that went horribly wrong. The certainty of England's number three against the short ball has yet to convince the West Indies, and Walsh sent down some torrid deliveries. Unfortunately for the bowler, Hick swung the ball away off edge and middle, hitting three fours as 15 came off the over.

Carl Hooper's appearance at the Pavilion end, no doubt to provoke Robin Smith's allergy to spin, gave Hick even more impetus. In the bullying form he normally saves for Worcestershire, he thrashed successive long- hops over mid-wicket and later punched a rare flighted delivery clean over long off into the Members in front of the Pavilion for six.

Scoring at an alarming rate, Hick posted his fifty off only 67 balls, hitting nine boundaries. But against the quicker bowling he has never quite exuded the control he has against spin. Coming around the wicket, Ian Bishop's change of angle brought doubt to his foot movement and a corking delivery that defied both slope and angle cut back between bat and pad.

Hick has been much criticised for being out bowled more often than a batsman of his standing should, but this was the delivery of the day, coming in murky conditions 10 minutes before bad light stopped play for the day, half an hour early.

In contrast, the West Indies began the day in much brighter light with a 74-run deficit, not an enviable position to be in had they brooded on their manager's pungent words about the state of the cracked pitch. The odd ball did keep low, but there wasn't nearly so much glove-wringing by the batsmen, and Keith Arthurton farmed the tail with unusual aplomb. Without his carefully crafted 75, an innings full of cautious nudges infiltrated by some searing cover drives, his team could easily have conceded a lead of 50 to England, which would have been a telling advantage in what has so far been a low scoring game. As it was, the tourists made 324, with Arthurton the last man out.

Fittingly, it was Angus Fraser who dismissed him, with the help of a breathtaking catch by Darren Gough as Arthurton hooked at a high bouncer. Fraser fully deserved his five-wicket haul, even if his bowling lacked the immaculate length and imagination of Friday's efforts.

Atherton, too, seemed short on ideas, and he must occasionally learn to gamble, as even Richie Benaud has advocated. England were definitely right to apply the cool compress to the West Indies strokeplay as a starting strategy, but yesterday definitely called for something a little more aggressive before lunch.

As it was, Atherton opened with Fraser and Dominic Cork, saving Gough for the new ball. When it arrived, nine overs later, the Yorkshireman removed Ottis Gibson, lbw to a ball that kept treacherously low for a hard-hit 29. Ian Bishop followed soon after, bowled by Cork as the ball cannoned into the stumps off the inside edge. But by then, England's advantage had been whittled away and it was down to the batsmen once more to set the West Indies enough runs to test their last-innings nerve and resolve.