By Neto Baptiste
Fifty (50) years on from his Test debut on November 22, 1974, iconic batsman and former West Indies captain Sir Vivian Richards recounts how tremendously intimidating the Indian supporters were in Bangalore as they faced a formidable India team with the likes of Sunil Gavaskar and Bhagwath Chandrasekhar.
Speaking on the Good Morning Jojo sports show, Sir Viv said that for a young cricketer from the tiny island of Antigua, it was an eye-opening experience.
“I was just totally intimidated with just the whole affair in itself where you’re in India. You’re playing your first Test match at a ground with about 70,000 people in there which is maybe more people than the country you live in and all of that is just intimidating you and this is happening everyday in terms of the five days for the Test match. Especially when a wicket falls and you have to go in to bat, when you’re walking in there and firecrackers are flying everywhere. At times I said to myself, Viv, what you put yourself in here because this is something totally different,” he said.
Sir Viv, who scored a total of 8,540 runs in 121 Tests could however, only manage scores of four and three runs in his two innings. He said that never dampened his spirits as he was well aware of his potential.
“As fast as I went in is as fast as I came back out, so that was something else. But I was always pretty much a confident guy, especially with the game I was involved with, and I felt that I was still in very much, good nick and when I say nick I mean good form for me to go on and do well because the wickets were pretty good in those days,” he said.
Underscoring that he would not change how things played out on his debut if given the opportunity, the Antiguan also recognised those who played a role in both his success and the success of the team.
“Just thank you so much to all my teammates and all the who would have done whatever. One of the things you would have heard with even Carlisle Best and his book and Brian Lara and all that sort of stuff, what I can tell you is that whatever in terms of the captaincy of the West Indies cricket team and what we would have achieved then which means I would have played the right set of guys because I think the book did say that Viv played a lot of his Leeward Islands guys and stuff like that so I am so thankful to all the individuals who would have played a part when I was captain,” Sir Viv said.
Sir Viv made his debut alongside Barbadian Gordon Greenidge who posted scores of 93 and 107 in the match which the West Indies won by 267 runs.
