King prepared to give special treatment to Lara
Guyana Chronicle
January 4, 2005

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MELBOURNE, Australia - New West Indies coach Bennett King says he is prepared to give special treatment to captain Brian Lara in order to protract the master batsman's career.

Responding to questions from the media - on the Caribbean side's arrival over the weekend for the VB Tri-Nation Series - that Lara is a difficult player to manage, King said his relationship with Lara "goes alright".

King indicated that Lara, who turns 36 years old in May, might be allowed certain concessions in training to allow him to play longer - maximiSing his contribution to West Indian cricket.

"We've got to be mindful of his longevity in the game and how we manage him so we get the best out of Brian for as long as he wants to play," King stated.

"Some people need to be treated differently and sometimes when you start maturing, you need to also be adaptable to some of their needs and the players around them need to understand that too.

Double world record holder Lara has been playing international cricket for the past 14 years, and is deep into the second half of his career that started with a November 1990 One-Day International against Pakistan in Karachi.

In the space of two months in 1994, Lara's 375 and 501 not out, broke world records for the highest Test and First-class scores, respectively.

He lost the world record to Australian Matthew Hayden (380) in October 2003 and regained it with an astounding unbeaten 400 in the final Test against England in Antigua last year, becoming the first man to reclaim the world Test batting record.

King, who took charge of the West Indies team following the team's success in the ICC Champions Trophy last September, acknowledges a need to tailor Lara's training regime to meet individual needs.

"He's hit ten million cricket balls in his career as it is, whereas a 20-year-old's probably hit about 200 000, so it's not going to take Brian that long to get into pretty good shape," King said.

Talking about his experiences with the team so far, King said: "It's been a pleasure to work with these boys from the islands and the limiting factor for them is the amount of resources that are available within the Caribbean to consistently train and put in the hours that some of the other nations have the opportunity to."

West Indies play their first practice match tomorrow, a day/night fixture against Victoria and face Australia-A in warm-up games on January 8 and 9, before beginning their VB Series campaign against Australia at Melbourne on January 14. Pakistan will be the third team in the VB Series