I think that Day 4 of this Test match was one of the best I have seen for some time, especially since I have been on so many losing West Indian tours recently. I know there are those who say that the West Indies nearly always play well at home. Please, give me my space to breathe some "good air" a bit, could you not?

These young men in the "new" West Indies cricket team deserve a chance. Let us give them a break. They deserve it already, for the cricket so far for four days. As it should be in Test cricket, both South Africa and the West Indies were trying to claw their way to advantage This is real tough stuff.

I wonder how many "oldsters" around might remember 1968, when Rohan Kanhai and (Sir) Garfield Sobers, batting against England, made 150 and 152, respectively here at Bourda? I remember that Test well too, for, as a 14 year old, I managed to get into Bourda using the same path I had taken in 1965 to see Bobby Simpson's Australians, my first glimpse of Test cricket.

The 1968 England Test was my "second" as a non-paying spectator, the same as I am these days. Things seldom change.

Being much too insolvent to pay at the turnstile, I did manage to get in in time to see my still all-time favourite West Indian batsman, Seymour Nurse, open the batting with Steven Camacho. Nurse got off the mark with a six from John Snow's bowling, a six to Regent Street off the top edge, made 49 and got out. That, for me, was that. I had already had such a great day, seeing "my" batsman, that I left after Nurse was out.

I went back later via the same route to see the second innings, when Sobers and Kanhai actually made the then lush green outfield become brown with their stroke-play.

Fast forward to the early to mid-70s when two youngsters, not unlike Marlon Samuels and Ramnaresh Sarwan were batting. One from Jamaica, one from Guyana, Lawrence "Yagga" Rowe and Alvin Isaac Kallicharran literally bludgeoned bowlers into extinction, trying desperately to out-do each other with their wonderful techniques, talent, temperament and appetite for tremendously large individual totals.

What I saw on Day 4 of this 1st Test match in 2001 featuring South Africa tells me that I should beware and be prepared for history repeating itself. I am more sure than I could be of paying taxes that some day very soon Marlon Samuels and Ramnaresh Sarwan will get hold of some international bowling attack in a Test match and, as Tony Cozier, would say; "will make a million".

Samuels is so "cool" that he probably thinks he should be in "GQ". Sarwan, humble and polite, shows that proper couth can produce proper perspectives. These two guys complement each other like my favourite cartoon characters, Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck. Soon, hopefully for the next decade, one will not be seen without the other on a cricket field. They will eventually make runs like the waters of the Keiteur waterfalls, continuous and plentiful.

The ease with which these two guys play Test cricket might suggest that Test cricket is easy. Believe me, it is not. Some people are just born to some things. These two have been born to advance the cause of West Indies Test batsmanship like no pair of batsmen since "Yagga" and "Kalli".

Samuels' 51 on Day 4 was a joy to behold, playing much beyond his years, while Sarwan showed character, charisma, class and chutzpa in garnering his 71 not out.

Now, all we can do is wait, for the final day's play to complete this canvas, as these two seemingly well matched teams slog out the final six hours, toe to toe, run for wicket, to see who will go to Trinidad & Tobago one Test ahead. Life has seldom been so good!!

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