SHIVNARINE CHANDERPAUL fashioned the type of innings on the opening day of the Cable & Wireless Series yesterday Australians have come to expect only from a somewhat more devastating West Indian left-hander.
As with so many of Brian Lara's masterpieces, Chanderpaul's exhilarating, if uncharacteristic, even 100 off 72 balls, his seventh overall, his first against Australia and the third fastest on record, was needed to drag the West Indies out of the mire into which they quickly slipped.
But neither by itself and nor through a partnership of 131 with the doughty Ridley Jacobs was it enough to prevent Australia maintaining the clear advantage they gained by removing the first five wickets for 53 in the first hour and a half.
The West Indies, batting after restored captain Lara won the toss in his first Test back at the helm, were all out for 237 in the third over after tea.
It was clearly an unsatisfactory return on a dry, typically lifeless Bourda pitch and an outfield that yielded 50 fours, in addition to four sixes, off the day's 78 overs, conditions Australia put into proper perspective by comfortably raising 120 by the premature close for the solitary, run out loss of Matthew Hayden.
Hayden fell for 10 to Vasbert Drakes' sharp pick up and direct underarm hit of the stumps from mid-on but his fellow left-handed partner, Justin Langer, resumes this morning 55 with Ricky Ponting 46 in a stand already worth 83.
Unless umpires Rudi Koertzen and Asoka deSilva are as generous to them as they were to the Australians, the West Indies face a long, hard slog to get back into the game. Even now, the likeliest option seems avoiding defeat.
The die had already been cast when Chanderpaul entered after an hour and 20 minutes in the No.6 position he himself had requested in a batting order that had to be revamped in the absence, for contrasting reasons, of Chris Gayle, Ramnaresh Sarwan and Carl Hooper.
Devon Smith, calm and composed for the 25 minutes his debut innings lasted, was the first of the unfortunates, ruled lbw to Brett Lee by Koertzen in spite of an inside edge audible from beyond the boundary and visible from the TV replay.
Daren Ganga's first innings in the West Indies after 17 Tests overseas lasted three balls, Jason Gillespie beating and bowling him on the backfoot with one that kept a little low.
When Wavell Hinds, driving to mid-off with a familiar lack of care, and Marlon Samuels, edging an extravagant drive off a googly to slip first ball, were out to successive deliveries from left-arm wrist spinner Brad Hogg, Chanderpaul appeared at 47 for four.
The crisis quickly deepened to 53 for five as Lara, after stroking six peerless fours in 26, was ruled lbw for 26 by deSilva to one from Andy Bichel that was likely to miss off-stump.
Chanderpaul's response was deliberate and uncompromising. He abandoned his accustomed guise as solid accumulator and donned the cloak of all-out aggression and the boundaries flowed in a torrent.
He knows Bourda better than any contemporary cricketer. It is where he has played since he was a boy in the Georgetown Cricket Club junior team, made his Test debut, aged 19, nine years ago, scored two of his previous six hundreds and averaged over 100 in six earlier Tests.
The slim left-hander needed only one ball to assess the bounty that was again on offer from opponents whose raggedness belied their undeniable status as the most formidable team of the era.
He came forward and punched the second, from Bichel, through mid-on for the first of his 15 boundaries.
A thumping pull for four off Lee, the fastest but wildest of the Australians, and a couple more boundaries off Bichel sent him to lunch at 28 from 22 balls.
With Jacobs batting in the robust manner he always does, the pair counter-attacked with abandon for an hour and three-quarters on either side of the interval as Australian captain Steve Waugh, marking his record 157th Test apprearance, seemed at a loss to know how to respond.
Even an injury to Jacobs provided only a brief interruption in the stand.
He was 16, and the total 112, when he fell to the pitch like a deflated blow-up toy, missing a sweep from leg-spinner Stuart MacGill. The upshot was that he wrenched his groin muscle so badly he needed a runner and was unable to keep wicket later, both roles that were filled by Hinds.
As Jacobs hobbled on, Chanderpaul took full toll of the unusually wayward bowling, especially Bichel, of whom he took 25 from 24 balls, and the wrist spin of MacGill (six fours and two sixes) and Hogg who were hammered for 64 from nine overs together right after lunch.
He swept MacGill for six in an over that also included two fours and passed his 50 from 37 balls. Another 32 balls later, he arrived at 100 with a square-driven four off MacGill.
Only a couple of mighty hitters, Viv Richards, now watching on as chairman of the West Indies selectors (off 56 against England in Antigua in 1986) and the Australian Jack Gregory (67 against South Africa in Johannesburg in 1922) have got to three figures off fewer deliveries than Chanderpaul's 69.
He lasted only three more balls, the victim of one of the day's four questionable lbw decisions, an excess for professional umpires on the ICC's exclusive panel .
The ball from the bustling Bichel that he attempted to pull pitched outside leg-stump but deSilva didn't notice and slowly raised his finger.
The blow to the unprotected inside of his left knee felled Chanderpaul and left him writhing on the pitch. It needed the golf cart, whose usual purpose is to carry the drinks, to transport him off the field, a rare end to an unforgettable innings.
Before the over ended, Bichel accounted for Vasbert Drakes to Adam Gilchrist's ground-level, right-handed snare behind the wicket but the battling Jacobs, barely able to stand on his left leg, wasn't finished.
Hit on the back by successive bouncers from Bichel, he responded by hoisting the next ball over the Rohan Kanhai Stand into Regent Street and remained defiant to the end, unbeaten 54.
Merv Dillon stroked 20 with a flourish, adding 38 with Jacobs before deSilva, after lengthy deliberation, again got his angles wrong on a lbw verdict after which the innings quickly subsided, leaving the Australians the rest of the sunny afternoon to enjoy the best of Bourda.