A Boy, a Man and a Game

By Stanton Sheogobind and Margaret Sheogobind

This book encapsulates the experiences of a five year old boy from the time he was fortunate to have witnessed a village cricket game sometime in 1949 in a far off field in Berbice, British Guiana. It was a defining moment of his life as the love of the game took hold of him then and in his later adult life. The story is centered around his adulthood in attending the first ever Cricket World Cup Tournament, held in the Caribbean in 2007 which is attended by him and a number of his son’s friends. Being surrounded by cricket literally on a 24/7 basis for the week; childhood and young adult memories pertaining to the game are evoked and these he shares with his audience. He shares with us some of the “memorable” games in which he took part. He also shares his experiences of some of the cricket teams to have visited Guyana from the 1950s to the 1980s. He unabashedly lets his audience know that he considers the period of the 60s and 70s to be the eras with which he associated his fondest memories. The great West Indian players Rohan Kanhai and Gary Sobers are his heroes. He also describes for his audience the other great cricketers from England, Australia, India, and Pakistan whom he had been able to see perform at the famous Bourda cricket ground in Georgetown, Guyana. In the final chapters he assesses the state of the game of cricket in the world today and the changes which the game had to undergo in order to survive in the fast-paced modern world. He ends his story by recounting with some of his grandchildren recounting cricket games in St. Lucia so as to introduce them to this game on which he has been hooked! He recounts that they thoroughly enjoyed the experience.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Aug 22, 2019
• ISBN: 9781796054262

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Copyright © 2019 by Stanton Sheogobind.

Library of Congress Control Number:   2019912257

ISBN:   Hardcover   978-1-7960-5428-6

             Softcover     978-1-7960-5427-9

             eBook           978-1-7960-5426-2

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted

in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system,

without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

Rev. date: 08/22/2019

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CONTENTS

Dedication

Introduction

Chapter 1   A Village Game

Chapter 2   Growing Up with Cricket

Chapter 3   To Georgetown and the Australians in 17

Chapter 4   To Barbados—World Cup of Cricket 27

Chapter 5   A Shopping Trip and the Roti Hut

Chapter 6   Cricket, Lovely Cricket

Chapter 7   A Bajan Fare and England Capitulates

Chapter 8   Beach Cricket and All That

Chapter 9   Hallowed Ground

Chapter 10   The Legends of My Time—the West Indians, the Australians, and the English

Chapter 11   The Men from the East—Indians and Pakistanis

Chapter 12   Playing Cricket My Way

Chapter 13   Another Game Sixty Years after 96

Chapter 14   The Game Today

Glossary of Terms

DEDICATION

This book is dedicated to my wife for her unstinting support and encouragement during this journey. Also, its dedicated to my five children and thirteen grandchildren. After all, it was they who suggested that we play some cricket during their visits. Some of them too were able to read the manuscript and to proffer advice on style and content. Special mention must be made of my daughter Geetangeli, who typed the first draft and to Krysta, my eldest granddaughter, whose assistance was invaluable in bringing this work to fruition. My wife also used her considerable artistic skills to design the cover.

I know that in completing this book I am leaving a part of myself for my family to hold in perpetuity.

INTRODUCTION

In the world of cricket, there was a team renowned for its exciting, refreshing, and aggressive brand of cricket. This team was the West Indies. This team had dominated the game of cricket from the decades of the sixties through the eighties. That was the team that had been formed from that disparate group of English-speaking nations of the Caribbean and Guyana on the South American coast. Sadly, that team today is a pale shadow of its former self as it is now placed at the bottom rungs of the world’s cricketing ladder. Of course, the type of cricket that is played by the team nowhere resembles the type of game associated with those great teams of the period mentioned before. The play is now seen as indecisive, and players are lacking in temperament and fighting spirit. As testimony of this, the crowds that had flocked to the stadiums worldwide are almost empty when the West Indies are in action.

The term West Indies surely is a misnomer, for all the countries are separate political entities and an independent state; therefore, they could each realistically become an affiliate of the world’s governing body of cricket, the ICC (International Cricket Council).

The administrative body for West Indian cricket was set up in the early years of the twentieth century, and besides the addition of a few members, countries have remained intact and continue to govern West Indian cricket up to the present. But friction has developed on more than one occasion between the players who are now unionized and the West Indies Board of Control. Disputes have ranged from remuneration to the awarding of players’ contracts. The most recent dispute saw the board and the players lock horns over a contract disagreement which resulted in the test team deserting the board on the eve of a test series with a team from Bangladesh. The board, to save face, chose a second-string team to represent the West Indies. Bangladesh, facing this hastily put together team, won the test series and the one-day internationals, much to the dismay of the West Indian public. The situation became so serious that there were strident voices being heard in Trinidad and Tobago to withdraw from the board. Trinidad and Tobago, after all, is the wealthiest board in the region. This would have had catastrophic results, perhaps even the breakup of the West Indian team.

The rift has been plastered over, but speculation is rife that with the fortunes of the team being so low, it is a matter of time when this archaic body known as the WICB is dissolved. Time will tell, as we are prone to say in the Caribbean.

Since the beginning of the twentieth century, a unified team was chosen by the main clubs in the more developed territories of Jamaica, Barbados, British Guiana (now Guyana), and Trinidad and Tobago. At this juncture, the infrastructure for cricket in the Leeward and Windward Islands was almost nonexistent, and only a handful of players from these islands were chosen to represent the West Indian team. This arrangement was hardly democratic, but credit must be given to those cricket lovers who were able to organize teams that were somewhat representative of the entire region. This presumably can be called one of the more tangible efforts at promoting Caribbean unity, a goal that has proven to be largely elusive. Cricket today, although in the doldrums in the region, is one of the threads that keeps us together. Cricket, an imperial tradition, was embraced wholeheartedly by the locals after its introduction by the ruling elite and its military personnel during the midnineteenth century. The English writer J. S. Barker, in his book Summer Spectacular, gives a thoroughly enjoyable account of the West Indian’s triumphant tour of England in 1963; and it stated that cricket, like so many things in the region that were imported from abroad, flourished exceedingly. This is a sentiment we can all agree with.

In the early 1900s, the first tour by a West Indian team was made to England, and these matches were accorded a first-class status. This was obviously a step in the right direction as it was recognized early on that the cricketing standards of the Caribbean were very high. English teams led by the likes of Lord Hawke and Plum Warner also made visits to the West Indies, and undoubtedly, the matches, which were played against the individual territories, gave the players the opportunity to hone their skills against English first-class players.

These cricket tours prepared the West Indies for test status, which were accorded them in 1928 on their tour to England. Between 1928 and 1950, the West Indies made four tours to England, and the English team made three tours to these enchanted islands. The West Indies also made their first visit to Australia, and because of that country’s all-white policy, the black players had to be granted special permission to enter that paradise. However, when the Aussies visited the West Indies for the first time in 1955, they were welcomed with open arms. On these early tours, the West Indian team was invariably defeated, especially in the damp conditions in England where the swinging ball exposed the flaws in the batting techniques of the West Indian batsmen. There was the exception of the redoubtable George Headley, who, very early on, stamped his class on the game where he was to become the first in line of a succession of the great batsmen from the region. In Australia, they had to cope with the likes of Bradman, Ironmonger, and Grimmett. Despite losing frequently, batting and bowling standards were rising, and great world-class players began to emerge. Besides Headley, there was the mercurial Learie Constantine, who bowled fast, batted like a hurricane, and electrified the game with his live-wire fielding. There were also the fast bowlers H. C. Griffith, G. N. Francis, and Manny Martindale, whose thunderbolts even unsettled the great Don Bradman. This surely was a harbinger of things to come!

Michael Manley, in his excellent work The History of West Indian Cricket, describes the year 1950 as the watershed of West Indian cricket, for it was in that year that our team had defeated England in a test series and in front of the English public. The team’s first test win was at Lord’s, considered to be the home of cricket. The West Indies won that series 3 games to 1, a convincing victory that gave the team recognition as a great cricketing power now being bracketed with Australia and England. A watershed it was indeed!

The sixties, seventies, and the eighties marked the rise and dominance of the West Indies in the world of cricket. This dominance by the team buoyed the spirits of the people of the region, instilling in them a spirit of self-belief and self-confidence. These new values were reflected in the rise of the nationalist movements in the various territories that were now seeking to become independent nations free from British colonialism and to chart their own destinies. Forbes Burnham, the first president of Guyana, had stated at a political rally that it was better to be in charge of your own canoe rather than being a cabin boy in a luxury liner.

Cricket, like so many aspects of life, is dynamic and has undergone many changes from its original format in order to survive in the modern, fast-paced world. There are now one-day games played over 50 overs, with each team batting 50 overs for each inning. The result of this is that there is always a result, no more draws. A variation of this format is the T20 game, where each side bats for 20 overs. This is a more fast-paced game, and it has been called instant cricket. This format provides for fun and entertainment that is nonstop. In India, this format has been fused with a Bollywood type of entertainment and has been successful in attracting large numbers of women and children to these games. These games, after all, last for about three hours, and so they provide entertainment for the entire family. The cricketing purists frown upon these games, and they complain that this format does not really develop the skills of the players. However, they have become the money-spinners for the various cricketing bodies in the world. There is now also a T20 World Cup for cricket, which is held every two years by the ICC. If it is not cricket, it certainly brings in the money. But it was because of the popularity of the 50 overs, a side game that prompted the governing body of cricket to inaugurate a World Cup for cricket along the lines of the FIFA World Cup for soccer. The inaugural tournament was held in England mainly because the one-day format was well established in that country and a large fan base had been developed. Also, the economic success of the tournament was guaranteed because at that time, England was clearly the economic powerhouse of the world of cricket. The staging of this landmark event was clearly a defining moment in the development of the game.

The tournament was a spectacular success both in terms of the cricket played and the economic boost it received from gate receipts and revenues from television. This tournament is scheduled every four years and has now become the showcase for cricket on a global scale. The first three tournaments were played in England with the West Indies winning both in 1975 and 1979. In these two tournaments, there were several outstanding performances by several West Indian players like Lloyd, Kanhai, Richards, and Kallicharran. In 1983, the mighty West Indians were again in the finals with their opponents being India, the surprise of the tournament. Everyone expected that the West Indians, with its strong batting and four fearsome fast bowlers, would carry the day for a third time. But as the well-known adage says, Cricket is a funny game. This one certainly was. On a green top wicket, Clive unleashed his quartet of fast bowlers, and India was shot out for a mere 183 runs. When the West Indies started its reply, Greenidge was bowled by a beauty from the Indian opening bowler, Sandhu, who was not even half as fast as the West Indian pace men. The greatest batsman in the world entered and began to strike the ball as if he had a plane to catch. Overconfidence got the better of him, and when he got out to a spectacular catch on the mid-wicket boundary, the West Indians seemed to lose heart. But conversely, that wicket galvanized the Indians, who proceeded to bowl the West Indians out for only 140 runs to win the 1983 World Cup. It was one of the biggest sporting upsets in all of sports history, and with it came a cataclysmic shift in the balance of power in world cricket. India, with its huge audience, developed a thirst for the one-day game, and so today, India has become the economic superpower for cricket. With its huge television base and cricket-crazy fanatics, India now controls over 70 percent of the world’s cricketing revenues.

Every cricket team now wants to tour India whereas previously, touring India was considered an afterthought. This was especially so of the English, who regularly sent a mediocre team on tours to India. Today, the Board of Control for Cricket in India has launched a league called the Indian Premier League to play T20 cricket. It has been fashioned along the lines of the English Premier League for soccer. The IPL, as it is now called, is a five-billion-dollar spectacle, and the stars of world cricket are contracted to play for enormous sums of money, which was previously unheard of in cricket. Many of the top players are paid in excess of two million dollars each for six weeks of work. No longer does England and Australia wield the power over world cricket as they had done throughout the twentieth century. ICC’s headquarters is no longer housed at Lord’s in England but in Dubai in the Gulf region, ostensibly a neutral site for this global organization.

After 1983, the venues for the World Cup was shifted to the other major cricketing nations. In 1987, it was held in the subcontinent. In 1992, it was the turn of Australia and New Zealand. On this occasion, there were several changes in the game to which we have become accustomed: the colored clothing and the white ball are two among the other changes, which have served to make the game very attractive to the spectators. In 2003, it was the turn of South Africa to host the tournament. That left only the West Indies as the only major cricketing power that has not staged a World Cup tournament. That honor was accorded them for the 2007 tournament. Imagine my joy on receiving this news as it presented the opportunity to view world-class cricket again. After all, the islands of the Caribbean were only a short plane ride away.

CHAPTER 1

A Village Game

Guyana, formerly British Guiana, is located in the