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The discipline and determination so evident from the start of the series have earned the West Indies a genuine chance of a stimulating victory on the last day of the second Cable & Wireless Test against South Africa today. They have remained resolute throughout four days of tense, enthralling cricket against opponents whose record justifies their rating as second only to Australia among Test cricket's elite.

The simple equation that confronts them is that they require exactly 200 more to achieve their goal of 232 with nine wickets in tact on a hard, dry pitch slow enough to render free scoring and incisive bowling impossible.

In other words, the team that is more patient and makes fewer mistakes will prevail.

After bowling South Africa out for 287 in their second innings behind the example of the peerless 500 Man, Courtney Walsh, the West Indies were left 11 potentially fraught overs to start their quest at the end of the day.

They lost opener Wavell Hinds, lbw on the backfoot to Jacques Kallis second ball to yet another questionable umpiring verdict in a match featuring too many of them.

They would have also started this morning without Hinds partner Chris Gayle but for Daryll Cullinan's high, two-handed miss at first slip off a top-edged slash from Shaun Pollock.

But the tall, forthright Gayle and the nightwatchman, Dinanath Ramnarine, another left-hander, survived to be 32 for one going into the remaining 90 overs.

The challenge is far from straightforward in a match in which runs have come at less than two and a half an over. But they have played throughout this match, as in the first draw in Georgetown, with a purpose never evident in Australia.

It is an attitude they seem to reserve for home Tests.

They may be heartened by the examples of Kensington, 1999, when Brian Lara led them to 311 in their second innings for an amazing triumph over Australia, and of the Antigua Recreation Ground last year when their dogged captain, Jimmy Adams, carried them to 216 to beat Pakistan.

They will take victory however it comes but they would rather it is less stressful than those two occasions when nine wickets were down, Walsh was at the wicket and, in the last case, they got the benefit of an umpiring error.

Walsh himself has done enough on his last appearance at the Queen's Park not to be saddled with that responsibility.

Should the revamped West Indies team, under its new captain, Carl Hooper, achieve the goal it would be a welcome stimulant to our cricket less than two months after the humiliating 5-0 thrashing in Australia.

The West Indies gained the initiative on the third day when wicket- keeper Ridley Jacobs unbeaten 93 prompted 92 from their last two wickets for a significant first innings lead of 56.

They maintained it yesterday with bowling of such tight control and ground fielding so slick that South Africa were restricted to 22 runs off 22 overs for the loss of a vital wicket in the hour and a quarter after lunch.

It was the defining period of the day, possibly the match.

Inevitably, the indefatigable Walsh set the example as he has repeatedly done throughout his 129 Tests.

On the previous afternoon, he had become the first man to reach the peak of the bowling Everest of 500 wickets. He spent most of the evening receiving messages of congratulations from presidents, prime ministers and the grateful people of the Caribbean.

He returned to Queen's Park yesterday to complete the job, adding four wickets to his 499th and 500th of the previous day as South Africa's vaunted lower order again buckled in the face of the pressure.

The last six wickets could only muster 83. In their only completed innings in the drawn Bourda Test, they went for 58, in the first innings here they yielded a mere 65.

Walsh's figures were six for 61 from 36 peerless overs, the first time he has taken so many in a Test innings at Queen's Park in what he is adamant is his farewell match on the ground. He had four for 21 from 20 overs on the day.

He and his colleagues were kept waiting an hour and a half for their first success but heads never dropped, shoulders never drooped, the fielding never slackened.

Opener Herschelle Gibbs and Daryll Cullinan continued from South Africa's overnight 130 for two and were proceeding at a comfortable, if unhurried, rate when Cullinan paid the price for a wild swing at leg-spinner Dinanath Ramnarine.

The shot was aimed somewhere over long-on. Instead, the leg-break found an outside edge that skewed a catch to point.

He followed his 103 of the first innings with 73 spread over four hours, five minutes and 178 balls. It was the third successive time he had fallen to Ramnarine, confirming reports of his dislike of such bowlers.

Cullinan and Gibbs put on 149 and, after they were separated, the West Indies regained the advantage. Ramnarine should have removed Neil McKenzie fourth ball but Lara at slip couldn't hold a low catch to his right off an uncertain edge.

The reprieve only allowed McKenzie to struggle for timing and form that increased pressure on those at the opposite end.

Gibbs' patience ran out when he pulled Walsh straight to Shivnarine Chanderpaul, substitituing for Ramnaresh Sarwan at squareleg, after labouring five hours, 50 minutes over 87.

The left-handed Lance Klusener, always a threat, sliced the impressive Dillon off the topedge to first slip after a brief stay and the second new ball, taken after tea and entrusted to Walsh and Dillon, wrapped up the innings with the last five wickets for 47.

McKenzie's tortured 25 off 134 balls ended with a catch to the keeper off Dillon who then passed Mark Boucher's wanton pull shot to hit off- stump.

Walsh claimed wickets four, five and six or, put another way, 503, 504 and 505 with a keeper's catch to account for the left-handed Nicky Boje, a clearcut lbw decision against Allan Donald and the underedge of Pollock's bat that dragged the ball back into the stumps.

He led the team off the field for the last time to the cheers of a grateful crowd.

It was now up to the batsmen.

© The Barbados Nation