McGrath urges Waugh to carry on

Australia fast bowler Glenn McGrath has urged Test captain Stephen Waugh to make himself available for the West Indies tour.

"I would like to see him continue," McGrath told reporters in Durban at the team's World Cup base. "He is still a very good captain and he has a lot to offer to the team.

"Look at the way he has done in the last few games, he has scored a 200 (against Victoria) and he has been hitting the ball well.

"The guy is going out there and still scoring runs and playing with the desire and passion to continue in the game."

Waugh, 37, who has played 156 Tests, a world record he shares with fellow Australian Allan Border, is yet to announce whether he is available for the tour, which begins at the end of March. He was not selected for the one-day squad contesting the World Cup.

Waugh's recent form has been outstanding. In first-class cricket in Australia this season he has scored 899 runs at an average of 47.31, an aggregate bettered by just one player, Queensland's Martin Love, who has 1,105 runs from one more match.

McGrath said one factor that might persuade Waugh to play on would be the prospect of a tour to India next year, a country where Australia have not won a Test series since 1985-86.

"I am sure that is in the back of his mind, to go to India and win," he said.

"The subcontinent, more so India, is the one place we have not really won yet and I am sure he would be pretty happy to call it a day after that."

McGrath is one of Waugh's closest friends. Waugh was best man at his wedding in 1999. When a bush fire threatened the Waugh family home during the current Australian summer, McGrath helped fight back the flames.

Despite their friendship, however, McGrath said he did not know whether Waugh would go to the Caribbean.

"I am not sure even if Lynette (Waugh's wife) knows," he said.

"That is Stephen, he keeps a lot close to his heart and if Lynette doesn't know there is only one person who does. Maybe he is still trying to work it out."

Waugh's latest Test was against England in Sydney in early January, when he made 102 to equal Don Bradman's mark of 29 Test match hundreds.

Waugh became Test captain in early 1999 in the Caribbean after Mark Taylor retired. Later that year the side started a world-record run of 16 successive Test wins spanning almost two years before losing a series 2-1 in India.