When Windies cricket is healthy, world cricket is healthy: Kallicharran
CHENNAI: In the space of six deliveries on Monday, Alvin Kallicharran
transported onlookers to a glorious time in the distant past when he was
wielding his bat for the West Indies. Just three days shy of his 70th
birthday, Kallicharran – who is in the city of his mother’s birth for the launch
of his autobiography ‘Colour Blind’ – was facing school kids eager to hurl a
tennis ball at him with all their might. In response, the left-hander exhibited
his wide repertoire of strokes just to show that his competitive juices are
still flowing.
Of course, such challenges are meat and drink for a man who conquered
the pace and aggression of Dennis Lillee in his pomp back in the 1975
World Cup, hitting him for 35 runs in a sequence of 10 deliveries. Ask him about taking on Lillee and he responds with relish. “If he was an aggressive pacer, don’t I have to retaliate? To play quick
bowling, you have to use a certain amount of aggression too. Otherwise, they will nail you,” says Kallicharran at the Akshar Arbol International School, accompanied by his noticeable Guyanese lilt.
The diminutive Kallicharran, standing at 5’4″, of course had no shortage of fast bowlers in his own team to prepare against in
the nets. Part of the West Indian side of the 1970s and 80s, he had the benefit of honing his skills against the likes of Andy Roberts, Michael Holding and Joel Garner.
“Roberts was the best fast bowler I ever played with or against. He just had a brilliant brain for fast bowling and could outwit his
opponents that way. Jeff Thomson and Michael Holding were the quickest though,” he recollected.