Lara out Windwards clash

The homesters will have to do without the services of star batsman Brian Lara who has been ruled out of the four-day clash against the Windwards Islands starting tomorrow at Shaw Park in Tobago.

Lara has been omitted from the 14-man squad named for the crucial match after he was advised by doctors to rest his injured knee, a release from the Trinidad and Tobago Cricket Board stated yesterday.

Trinidad and Tobago are joint front-runners with Barbados after collecting first innings points in their rain-affected drawn match against Guyana last weekend at Guaracara Park, Pointe-a-Pierre.

TT are tied at the top of the table on 24 points with Barbados.

The 36-year-old Lara played a crucial role in enabling his team to overhaul the big Guyanese first innings total of 346 when he slammed a superlative 153 in his first appearance for the national team in two years last weekend.

It was hoped that he would be fit to play in the remaining matches in the Carib Beer Series and hopefully guide Trinidad and Tobago to the final.

Trinidad and Tobago have not won a senior four-day regional championship since 1986 when a Rangy Nanan led team accomplished the feat.

The Windwards are bottom of the six-team table and are smarting from having to sit out their clash with the Leewards when the entire four-day fixture was washed out by rain.

However home skipper Daren Ganga, who last week was recalled to the West Indies team to tour New Zealand next month is confident that his team can beat the Windwards to go clear in the regional standings.

"Our objective will be to win against the Windwards," Ganga said. "We know we are capable of winning, and we will be planning how to get full points from this match because it will be crucial in deciding the outcome of the competition."

The Trinidad and Tobago selectors have not disclosed the name of the player who will take over from Ganga, when he departs for New Zealand with the West Indies team but it is expected that Tishan Maraj will be handed the captaincy.

TT Squad: Daren Ganga (captain), Dwayne Bravo, Rayad Emrit, Sherwin Ganga, Sanjiv Gooljar, Amit Jaggernauth, Richard Kelly, Imran Khan, Tishan Maraj, Gregory Mahabir, Dave Mohammed, Denesh Ramdin, Lendl Simmons.