History of the West Indian cricket team Indian pace attack) and Roger Harper (who came and went). However, this did not immediately affect their performance. Richie Richardson proved to be a decent successor to Richards. A new crop of young players emerged such as Brian Lara, Curtly Ambrose, Ian Bishop, Jimmy Adams, Carl Hooper, Phil Simmons, Keith Arthurton and Winston Benjamin. It was five more years before the West Indies lost a series, but they had a number of close shaves before then. Making a comeback to international cricket, South Africa played its first Test match in Bridgetown, a match which was attended by fewer than 10,000
History of the West Indian cricket team against Durham, which improved upon Hanif Mohammad's thirty-five-year-old record as the highest score in first-class cricket. The West Indian bowling attack was spearheaded by Curtly Ambrose and Courtney Walsh, the latter setting a then world record of 519 wickets. However, these two had both retired by 2001, and their successors failed to maintain the high standards that Ambrose and Walsh had set. Despite the emergence of some good batsmen like Shivnarine Chanderpaul and Ramnaresh Sarwan, Brian Lara remained the crucial figure of the side. After a 2–0 defeat by New Zealand in 1999–00, Lara was replaced as captain by Jimmy