SEVERAL e-mails have drawn my embarrassed attention to my inadvertent omission of Sonny Ramadhin on the list of living West Indies Test cricketers over the age of 80.
Palpable carelessness led to the error, compounded by the realisation that I had delivered the first Sonny Ramadhin lecture at the University of the West Indies (UWI) St. Augustine campus and, as editor, had included him among the 20 most influential West Indies cricketers of the 20th century in the January 2001 edition of the Caribbean Cricket Quarterly.
Born May 1, 1929, Ramadhin is now 85 years, 151 days, making him the third oldest West Indies Test player after Andy Ganteaume (93) and Sir Everton Weekes (89). Lance Gibbs who turned 80 yesterday (Monday) is the latest to reach the milestone.
No West Indies players have made a more dramatic entry onto cricket’s international stage than “Ram”, as he is universally known, and Alf Valentine on the 1950 tour of England when West Indies won their first Test in England, at Lord’s, before proceeding to a 3-1 triumph in the series.
Ram, born in the south Trinidad village of Esperance, was the first player of East Indian descent to represent West Indies; Valentine was a Jamaican, born in Kingston.
Aged 20, they were virtual unknowns when selected on the basis of a couple of first-class matches back home; it didn’t take long for them to undermine English batsmen with their contrasting methods.
Ramadhin mesmerized them with each-way spin flicked from his fingers, much as another Trinidadian Sunil Narine does at present; in contrast, Valentine gained his success from vicious left-arm turn.
Between them, they took 59 wickets in the four Tests, Valentine 33, Ramadhin 26. “Ram” had 135 wickets at the ridiculous average of 14.88 runs in all first-class matches.
Even before the series was out, Lord Beginner immoratalised them in his calypso as “those two little pals of mine, Ramadhin and Valentine”.
When Ramadhin’s played the last of 43 Tests in 1960, he had 158 wickets at an average of 28.98; Valentine had 139 in 36 Tests at 30.32 each.
Ramadhin lives in England after settling there, and marrying an English girl, over 40 years ago. He played in the Lancashire leagues and in county cricket for Lancashire where his son-in-law Willie Hogg and grandson Kyle were highly-rated fast bowlers.
