Will Lara's 501 not out remain unsurpassed?

That cricket is a batsman’s game is well known and another cliché associated with sport is that records are meant to be broken. But it is safe to say that some records will never be broken their longevity standing as testimony to this...

- PARTAB RAMCHAND

On the 26th anniversary of Brian Lara’s world record score of 501 not out in first-class cricket it is perhaps apt to ask the question – will any-one surpass that mark? The West Indian left-hander went past Hanif Mohammed’s 499 notched up for Karachi against Bahawalpur in 1959 to set the present record. And it is interesting to note that since Lara got that score for Warwickshire against Durham at Edgbaston on June 6 1994 the only batsman to register a score of 400 is – Lara. That was when he regained his world record in Test cricket in 2004 by flaying the England bowlers at Antigua going past Matthew Hayden’s 380 made some six months earlier for Australia against Zimbabwe.