What a way to celebrate 75 years of West Indies cricket. The present West Indies team, led by Brian Charles Lara has started the year on the wrong foot. At a time when we are about to, in conjunction with Scotiabank and the other sponsors, celebrate 75 years of West Indies cricket, the maroon-clad team, which, under former captains Clive Lloyd and Viv Richards were almost invincible, has sunk to its lowest ever in the history of West Indies cricket.
Lara’s prideless team gave us an early-year gift by meekly surrendering to an all-out 47 in the first Cable and Wireless test match against the Old Foe England at Sabina Park, Jamaica.
It was not the defeat but the manner of the spectacular collapse that made die-hard West Indies fans all over the region want to give up on the regional team.
The first three days were hard-fought, but the Windies collapsed like a pin-pricked ballon and the match was all over before lunch on the fourth day’ a period when the West Indies lost all 10 wickets.
The 47 all-out score and the current team’s latest position in the World test rankings, is not what we will want to remember the 75 years of West Indies cricket by.
No! We would have liked to dwell upon at this time, the many high points of the team and the individual performances of the players from the Caribbean, whose swashbuckling style with bat and ball made the regional team crowd-pleasers where ever they went and resulted in outstanding team results, the highpoint being the 15-year period when the West Indies ruled world cricket.
As a starting point, in our tribute to those players whose efforts helped make West Indies cricket the institution that it is today, we will use not the first test match at Lords in 1928 where the West Indies lost by an innings and 58 runs but the first test victory. What better way to celebrate when it all started, that first test victory, the sweet taste of it.
And, Guyana played a big part in that victory for it was right here in then British Guiana at Bourda, that the first win was achieved against, yes, England, in the third Test of the 1930 series.
This match was historic for a variety of reasons, it was not only the West Indies first victory in Test cricket but a number of West Indian players also achieved historic landmarks during the match.
Clifford Roach’s double century (209) was the first by a West Indian batsman in Test cricket; George Headley’s 114 in the first innings and 112 in the second innings was a first century-in-each- innings of a test match by a West Indian batsman.
Learie Constantine’s five-wicket haul in the second innings was also a first five-wicket haul by a West Indian bowler. Incidentally, Roach was also the first batsman to score a century in test cricket scoring 122 in the first innings of the second test just pipping Headley who scored a century in the second innings.
And there are other firsts although I will not list them all. The West Indies were the first team to win the Prudential Trophy at the inaugural World Cup limited overs tournament when on June 21st 1975, Clive Lloyd’s team scored 291-8 with the skipper himself leading the way with a pulsating 102. Australia in their turn were dismissed for 274 in 58.4 overs of the 60-overs-a-side match. Who will forget the motorcade arrival of Lloyd when he finally came to Guyana with the Prudential Trophy, the thousands that lined the streets as the motorcade drove triumphantly through. Lloyd’s professional team repeated the feat in 1979 with Viv Richards scoring an undefeated 138 while Collis King blasted 86 as the West Indies 286-9 defeated England 192 all out after an opening stand of 128 between Geoff Boycott and skipper Mike Brearley. The West Indies had finally mounted limited overs cricket’s exalted throne. However, Lloyd’s team lost in the 1983 final to India when seeking a three-peat a match that gave as much joy to Indian fans as it gave grief to West Indians. Indian superstar Sachin Tendulkar later told me that this victory was the inspiration for his career.
And what about that still talked about match. The famous Tied test between the West Indies and Australia. The first test of the 1960-61 series between the West Indies and Australia produced the first tied test match in cricket’s history.
The West Indies, under the captaincy of Frank Worrell, were playing Australia at Brisbane and the opening test match at the Gabba saw the West Indies batting first and making 453 runs. The world’s greatest all-rounder Sir Garfield Sobers scored 132 while Allan Davidson grabbed 5-135. Australia, in reply, Australia scored 505 with Norman O’ Neil making 181 and Bobby Simpson, 92. Wes Hall, 4-140 was the pick of the bowlers for West Indies.
West Indies in their second knock, were bowled out for 284, Worrell topscoring with 65 as Davidson grabbed 6-87 for a match haul of 11-212. Set 232 for victory, Australia were tottering on 92-6 when skipper Richie Benaud and Davidson took the score to 226 only seven runs away from victory. But Guyanese Joe Solomon, who after this match entered the folklore of great West Indian cricketers, ran out Davidson for 80 with a direct hit of the stumps.
Without addition to the total, the West Indians became jubilant when Benaud was caught behind. Things looked bad for the Windies when Hall missed a run out attempt of Ian Meckiff at 227 for 8, and then dropped Wally Grout off his own bowling. But with the scores level at 232 Meckiff was run out by Conrad Hunte and then Solomon threw down the stumps to run out Kline going for the run that would have given Australia the victory.
And, although the West Indies lost the series by a 2-1 score the fans were so enraptured by their style of play that they lined the streets in their thousands to bid farewell to the West Indies team.
But it was not only team moments that hold special fondness for the West Indian fans but individual achievements as well. Sobers’ world record score of 365, which stood as the highest test score only to be broken by Lara’s 375 ranks up there with the greatest.
Viv Richards assault on the England bowlers en route to the fastest test century off only 56 balls in the 1986 series at St John’s, Antigua is another. And who can forget Alvin Kallicharran’s mauling of Australian speed menace Dennis Lillee, or Rohan Kanhai’s falling down hook. Or Colin Croft’s 8-29 at the Queen’s Park Oval, or the breaking of the most test wickets record by Lance Gibbs and Courtney Walsh, Curtly Ambrose’s 7-1 spell or his rout of England in 1994 when England were dismissed for 46, or the exploits of Malcolm Marshall, Andy Roberts, Michael Holding, Jack Noriega, Joel Garner, Desmond Haynes, Basil Butcher, Carl Hooper, Roger Harper, Gordon Greenidge, Roy Fredericks, the Three W’s, Ramadhin and Valentine and Lawrence Rowe. But history is not all about what is good. Some memories that lie forever in our minds are sometimes about events that affect us the most. Like the loss of a long-loved one. We may try to forget, but the memory lives on and on. So it is with West Indies cricket. While at times we cringe at some of the lows the team has suffered we also realise that the team has given us many hours of pleasure, many memories to cherish, to relive day after day, to pass on to our children and their children. But like the loss to India in the World Cup final, the defeats suffered at or away from home, the low scores, the dropped catches, the South Africa stand-off and last but by no means least, the `Party Four’ at the Red Stripe Mound in Jamaica, all those memories that we wish to forget are all part and parcel of West Indies cricket. It is a reminder that cricket, like us human beings, is not perfect. As in life, there will be good and bad times, so too with cricket. West Indian fans must take the bitter with the sweet, savour those memories where the team triumphs and cry with, but support the team in its hour of need. So it has been. So it will always be.