Lara reveals Chappell's remarks spurred team to win

Port of Spain, May 27 (UNI) Greg Chappell's comments that West Indies has forgotten how to win a match cost Team India dearly and host captain Brian Lara revealed that his side was spurred by the ''sly'' comment and wanted to prove the Australian wrong.

''That comment really spurred us on. It was a sly one and the guys took notice of it. We wanted to prove that wrong and at least for these matches we have succeeded. It is nice to prove him wrong,'' Lara said in a press conference after his side beat India by six wickets to take an unbeatable 3-1 lead in the five-match series.

The West Indies also felt that India badly missed the services of Sachin Tendulkar and that probably was the difference between the two teams.

''We had a long team meeting and we realised that India was under more pressure to win here. They were without Sachin who has consistently played well. We knew if we could nail few key players in the Indian team, we could win. We needed all our eleven players to perform and the boys did well,'' he explained.

India coach Greg Chappell, meanwhile, described the series loss as a big wake up call for the Men in Blue.

''We didn't bat well, bowl well and field well. We didn't came to grips with the wickets. We were batting too aggressively on these slow wickets when more solid batting was required. It is a nice wake up call,'' said Chappell.

Skipper Rahul Dravid said that allowing the West Indies to come back from difficult situation in the second game turned out to be crucial for the series result.

''We allowed them to grapple back in the second match after they were struggling. We also struggled adjusting to the slow pitches here. Bowlers bowled wrong lengths while the batsmen also failed to read the pitches. We didn't had enough runs on the board,'' Dravid summed up the key reasons to India's failure in this series.

He, however, defended playing five bowlers and said, ''We have more faith in (MS) Dhoni and (Irfan) Pathan as batsmen than on Yuvraj (Singh) and (Virender) Sehwag as bowlers. Right now five bowlers fit our plan.

''However, strategies are not written on stone. When we are successful we stick to them and when we fail we need to review them.

We need to sit down and review what the best combination could be.'' Dravid also said that the loss is a big learning experience for the team and as the next World Cup is in West Indies, players have gained in invaluable experience.

He also hinted that young Karnataka batsman Robin Uthappa might be given a chance in the fifth and final match.

''Robin has batted well in the two games he got opportunity. We need to think differently. May be Sehwag on these pitches could be the man who comes down the order and rotate strike and also hit when needed,'' he added.

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