Adelaide, November 26:

Justin Langer fell for 99 four balls from stumps in a late blow for Australia after Brian Lara stole the show for the West Indies with a double-century to become Test cricket’s all-time leading runscorer in the third Adelaide Test on Saturday. The veteran opener was stalled on 99 for 20 minutes before he was out just short of his 23rd Test century. At stumps, Australia were 229/3 in reply to the tourists’ first innings of 405 to trail by 176 runs with three days left. New No 4 batsman Brad Hodge was not out 13 with Mike Hussey yet to score.

The Australians have already secured the Frank Worrell Trophy series following 379-run and nine-wicket wins, but boosted by Lara’s record-breaking 226, the tourists realised their only highly-competitive first innings total of the series after scoring 210 and 149 in the previous Tests. The Australians also lost their skipper Ricky Ponting for 56, lbw to Dwayne Bravo after putting on 114 runs for the second wicket with Langer. Opener Matthew Hayden was snapped up at short cover low down by Shivnarine Chanderpaul off Bravo for 47. Lara’s 405-minute vigil was ended when he was bowled by Glenn McGrath. Lara boosted the West Indians to a powerful first innings total of 405 in his 298-ball knock with 22 fours. The rest of his team contributed just 162 in the total.