KEY POINTS:
The word "legend" is bandied around indiscriminately in sport but it fits Sir Garfield Sobers like the glove that wouldn't have fitted him had he been left with the six fingers on each hand with which he was born: from birth, he seemed marked out for distinction.
He achieved it - one only has to consider his extraordinary versatility. In 93 tests between 1953 and 1974, he scored 8032 runs, averaging 57.78.
As for his 235 test wickets, which cost 34.03 runs each, he got them bowling both slow left-arm orthodox and left-arm fast-medium, as well as, just when his repertoire was beginning to look a bit limited, a devastating chinaman. Nor did he have any peers in the art of close-catching.
Oh, and his 365 not out against Pakistan in 1958, which stood for 36 years as the record individual test score, remains the highest maiden test century of all time. We'll say no more about his six sixes in an over, because he sometimes thinks that it is the only achievement for which he's known.
Sobers is sporting royalty and has an appropriately regal aura. He is regally dismissive of today's cricket before he gets into stride with what is wrong with West Indian cricket.
"It is a very different game now. In England, all the grass has gone from the wickets. In 1957, I went to Lord's and sat up on the balcony for 15 minutes, staring. Everton Weekes came to me. He said, 'Son, what are you looking for?' I said, 'Sir, I'm looking for the wicket'. He said, 'You won't see it until they put the stumps down'. Now the green tops have gone.
"I would not enjoy playing in England now. It's like everywhere else. And they don't have wet wickets any more. Or a back-foot rule. Now they have a front-foot rule. You can only bowl so many bouncers an over, only have two men behind square. The bowlers are the ones who've suffered.
"If Bradman played today, he'd be far better. Today, people are bowling from 22 yards. In those days, they bowled from 20 yards with four leg slips, six bouncers an over, beamers were not called no-balls, on wet wickets."
Sobers allows that West Indies cricket is not at its best.
"That's the least I can say. But the idea that youngsters are playing basketball and baseball ... you know, Richie Benaud started that rumour some time ago and I'd like to put it to rest. People make a mistake saying there is not a lot of cricket being played in the West Indies today. In fact, there is more than ever before.
"It's a myth. And if you look at the American basketball scene, can you name me two West Indian players? We know nothing about baseball. Soccer, yes. Over the last 15 years, lots of soccer players have gone to England. If someone said to me that soccer is the reason for West Indian cricket falling so low, I might think about it."
But the real problem is television.
"I have two boys, both very good cricketers with all the attributes, but they never wanted to play because I was their father. My kids wanted their own identity and I understand that. But they also wanted to watch TV.
"When they got home from school, they would not go outside and play, they would sit in front of a video. That's your real culprit. Kids do not organise games of cricket by themselves, playing outside morning, noon and night. Today, if it is not organised, nobody leaves home. They wait for you to pick them up, take them to the ground, give them the best cricket attire. The natural flow of the game has gone.
"I recall the days when people like myself and Sir Everton played for nothing. The pride and honour of playing for your country was more important than what you put in your pocket. Today, that has gone. We have talent in the West Indies but no pride.
"A team that has done nothing for the last 15 years, every time they sit down at the table, their representatives ask for more money. If you had executives working in your company who weren't producing, you'd fire them.
"But these fellows don't get fired; they ask for more money. And if they don't get it, they strike.
"You know, I came to England [with the West Indies] in 1957. I had my 21st birthday there. We played 37 games that season and it was like heaven. I got £5 a week. Today they play three one-day games in eight days and say they're tired. They're tired of making money, that's what they're tired of. I used to believe practice makes perfect. If you don't practise, you can't achieve perfection, and then people wonder why the first ball goes to third slip ... " - an apparent crack at England bowler Steve Harmison, whose first ball in the most recent Ashes series went directly to the slips cordon.
Sobers also told some beguiling stories, in particular one about his last test at Lord's in 1973. Sobers was 31 not out at the end of the first day's play. Clive Lloyd then asked him if he fancied going for a curry at the home of some Guyanese friends.
He went, had a good time and then progressed to the Q Club, a London nightclub owned by Jamaicans, where he met a pretty girl he'd already encountered in Birmingham and danced with her until 4.30am. She gave him the slip, so he went with another West Indian friend to Clarendon Court near Lord's for "a reminisce".
"We drank until about 9 o'clock, then I got a cold shower, walked up to Lord's, got my pads on and walked out as the umpires called play. I took guard but all I could see as Bob Willis ran up was arms and legs.
"The first five balls I missed and I could hear Rohan Kanhai and everyone else up in the pavilion laughing. Anyhow, the sixth ball hit the bat and I got to about 70 but then my stomach started giving me problems.
"I got my hundred, then walked over to [umpire] Charlie Elliott. I said, 'Charlie, I have to go'. He said, 'Go, what for? I haven't seen you get any injury.' I said, 'Charlie, I've held this in for 50 minutes, I can't hold it any longer. Put down whatever you like. I gone'."
He retired on 150 not out and in the pavilion settled his stomach with glasses of port and brandy. One wonders whether the story of Andrew Flintoff's World Cup pedalo adventure will one day provoke such delighted laughter.
- THE INDEPENDENT
