Big and strong, Clyde
Walcott was a savage hitter, renowned for his back-foot driving. C.L.R. James
noted in his Beyond a Boundary: “For
defence and power in putting away the length ball this is one of the greatest
of all batsmen. Only Bradman can be mentioned in the same breath for commanding
hooking of fast bowlers.”
Like Weekes, he
revelled on the Indian tour of 1948-49, cracking 452 runs at an average of 75.33.
His greatest run, however, was when Australia came calling in 1954-55. Walcott
hit a century in each innings of not one, but two Tests - 126 and 110 at Port
of Spain, and 155 and 110 at Kingston. No one else has achieved this feat in
the same series. Before that he had scored 108 in another Test at Kingston. Not
even Bradman had managed five hundreds in the same rubber. Walcott’s tally in
that series was 827 at 82.70 per innings. This capped his consistent showing at
home; during the previous two seasons he was a prolific scorer against England
and India.
Along with Weekes, he
feasted on the Indian bowling. Not to be left out, Worrell finally joined the
party with his 237 at Kingston in 1952-53. Walcott eventually finished with
3798 runs at an average of 56.68 in 44 Tests, matching Weekes’ 15 tons, and his
wicketkeeping abilities were a bonus.
One of the reasons
why he retired in 1959 at the age of thirty-three was that, as the celebrated
C.L.R. James noted in his Beyond a
Boundary, he was frustrated at the continued appointment of only a white
man as captain of the West Indies. So when his great mate Frank Worrell
eventually led the West Indies shortly thereafter, the big hitter would have
been a satisfied, if not totally contented, man. That feeling would have grown
when Walcott himself went on to become president of the West Indies Cricket
Board and chairman of the International Cricket Council (ICC).
Overall, Worrell
stood up to England, the best side for much of the 1950s before his own team
turned the tables; Weekes was the scourge of India; and Walcott was awesome on
home turf. Put together, they appeared in 143 Tests for the West Indies and
amassed 12,113 runs at an average of 54.80, notching up 39 hundreds. For those
times when much less Test cricket was played than at present, it was a
phenomenal performance.
Few chapters in the
game are as romantic and colourful. It was the three inimitable Ws, aided by
the spin twins Sonny Ramadhin and Alf Valentine who put Caribbean cricket on
the high road to the summit that later outfits led by Gary Sobers, Clive Lloyd
and Vivian Richards scaled in the next three decades. George Headley was, of
course, the pioneer, and the enormously talented Learie Constantine with his
fellow speedster Manny Martindale had shown early glimpses of the fearsome pace
battery that was to follow.
But it was Worrell,
Weekes and Walcott who set the trend for top-class West Indies line-ups of
succeeding generations - Hunte, Kanhai, Butcher, Sobers and Nurse; Lloyd, Rowe
and Kallicharran; Greenidge, Haynes and Richards; Richardson, Lara and
Chanderpaul to carry forward the tradition. The Ws propelled West Indies
cricket towards glory, and that is their true contribution
(Author Indra Vikram Singh can be contacted
on email singh_iv@hotmail.com).
Don’s
Century
Published
in India by Sporting Links
ISBN
978-81-901668-5-0
Fully
illustrated
Paperback
French Fold 11 x 8.5 x 0.4 inches
188
pages
