Lara aiming for double century

Brian Lara promised his home crowd a double century after scoring 159 not out on the first day of the second Test between the West Indies and South Africa in Port of Spain on Friday.

The West Indies, who won the toss and chose to bat, were 281 for six when bad light ended play three overs early.

"I really enjoyed this innings, and within the first 15 minutes I thought this could be something big," Lara told a news conference.

"My home crowd hasn't seen a double century from me yet, and that would be good."

Lara batted with barely controlled aggression and scored all around the wicket. He faced 236 balls and hit 20 fours.

Lara's century was his 27th, which made him the West Indian with the most Test hundreds to his credit.

Previously, both Lara and Garfield Sobers had 26 centuries.

His innings also saw him leapfrog Sunil Gavaskar (10,122) and Sachin Tendulkar (10,134) into third place on the list of all-time leading run-scorers in Test cricket.

Lara and six other players were not considered for the first Test in Georgetown, which was drawn, because of a sponsorship contract dispute.

The incident cost Lara the West Indies captaincy, which fell to Shivnarine Chanderpaul.

"It's probably the best decision in terms of where West Indies cricket is at the moment," Lara said of the change in captaincy.

"I love playing for the West Indies, and it doesn't matter to me who the captain is.

"Sometimes you can lean on the captaincy, now I've got to stay in the team by scoring runs."

Lara is playing in his first Test match since August, but said he had prepared well.

"It was about the best I've felt coming into a Test match in Trinidad and Tobago," he said.

"I was under pressure, as I have been for my entire career, and I needed to perform."