As former West Indies cricket captain Sir Vivian Richards celebrated his 60th birthday last Wednesday, Kito Johnson revisits a 2010 encounter with the sporting legend...
A Born Leader
The only thing missing is the trademark chewing gum. And, as he swaggers up to me in that distinct gait, his head tilted high, and his shoulders pulled back almost to the point where the blades touch each other, the aura of invincibility that so many have talked about is instantly recognisable. Although the word 'great' has had its currency devalued over the years by overuse in a culture today which seeks instant superstardom, there can be no doubting the sheer quality of the man sitting opposite me.
Scrutinise any poll pertaining to the best cricketers ever to have graced the game, and the name I V A Richards inevitably crops up. To this day, Vivian Richards remains the only West Indies captain never to have lost a Test series whilst at the helm. Richards stood out because while all those around him padded themselves out in fear of the increasing lethality of fast bowling, he would stroll out from the pavilion, and with only his baggy maroon cap for protection, bludgeon the opposition bowlers into submission.
After some general chit-chat, we delve into Richards' early years in Antigua. He explains the critical role played by his father in shaping his personality; both as a young man, and then ultimately, as a cricketer. "My father indulged us in a host of different sports when we were young.
"At the end of the day, though, he was a very strict disciplinarian, and there were times growing up when I felt that he would go overboard with the smacking and so forth. It was only when I became an adult and looked back on it, that I realised he was right.
"I really appreciated the sense of discipline that he had instilled in me. I learnt the leadership role from a very young age, because whenever we were playing any team sport in our neighbourhood, everyone wanted Viv to be the captain. It's amazing looking back at it now, how everyone just felt that I had this leadership quality. With that sort of trust put in me at an early stage, I took it very seriously and started to be more assertive about being in control, and being responsible for other individuals. "I felt that it was my calling."
Coming of age
At the age of 19, the young man left his tiny tropical paradise and headed to England to further his trade. In the early 70s, Britain was bulging at its social seams, as second-generation West Indian migrants had begun to demand an end to the unfair treatment and racial discrimination that they were suffering. Richards recalls this period all too well.
"There would be advertisements for places to rent, but in the windows there would be signs saying: 'No Irish, No Blacks, No Dogs'." The treatment of West Indian people in Britain at the hands of the establishment, and more over, of black people across the entire globe, would have a serious impact on the thinking of the young man from St John's.
Alf Gover Cricket School in South London attracted some of the most talented players in the country, and it was there that the young Richards went to hone his skills, which would later see him become the most formidable batsman in all forms of the game. "The inspiration to play cricket professionally came when I started watching some of the English county cricketers in the nets. These were men being paid money to play cricket, and I immediately felt-with no disrespect to those whom I was watching-that I could bring something different on board.
"Whilst those guys had the correctness in the shots that they played, I felt that I had a certain flair in the way I played my shots, or even in the athletic way that I ran around the field. Ultimately, I felt that if that guy over there could make it, then I could definitely earn a living from this too, and started to work harder to improve all aspects of my game."
And improve he did. Richards eventually broke into the West Indies team in 1974; making his debut in the tour to India. The camaraderie in the West Indies dressing room, as well as its hierarchical structure, would help to keep Richards' feet firmly planted on the ground.
"When I first came in to the team, I was pretty much junior to people such as Alvin Kallicharan, Clive Lloyd, Vanburn Holder, and Bernard Julien. These were guys whom I had admired growing up as a kid, and guys whom I would be listening to on the radio when they played in places like Lord's. So, to be sharing a dressing room with these guys now was a bit like wow.
"I did my chores and paid my dues, like I think every junior in the game should. There were times on tour when the senior guys had too many bags, so you would make yourself useful by carrying one of theirs, in addition to yours," Richards remembers with a chuckle. Sir Viv reckons that coming up against the world's best spinners in India, and then the game's most feared fast bowling duo at the time-Jeff Thompson and Dennis Lillee-later in Australia, was a baptism of fire, which stood him in good stead. And so, by the time India came to the West Indies in 1976, the warrior's sword had been well and truly blooded.
Greatest innings ever played
He would score huge centuries in three of the four tests played in the Caribbean, and took that form with him to England in the summer, where massive innings of 232 at Trent Bridge, 135 at Old Trafford, and 291at the Oval in London helped the West Indies to regain the Wisden trophy. By the end of that year, Richards had scored 1,710 runs at an astonishing average of 90. The feat was all the more remarkable considering Richards had missed the entire second test at Lord's through illness.
It may come as a surprise to many, though, that despite all the accolades that have been bestowed upon him, Richards describes his refusal to support the apartheid regime in South Africa, by turning his back on a "blank-cheque" offer to go and play there, as "the greatest innings that I have ever played."
"On the morning when Ali Bacher came for my signature, all the other West Indian players were waiting to see what I would do. If I had gone, there would have been a serious exodus of players, which would have spoilt not just what I stood for, but also what those whom I knew stood for."
For Vivian Richards, the decision was a personal one, and he bears no ill will to those West Indies players who decided to accept the tainted kruggerand. He explains, however, that news of South Africa's most famous prisoner of conscience, Nelson Mandela, helped shape his decision, and that of most of his teammates.
"I am not going to use this as an opportunity to criticise or judge those guys who went, but when we learnt that Nelson Mandela listened to the commentary of some of our matches on the radio from his prison cell, I and the other conscious members in the team, decided to take a stand to do our little bit to add to the volume of condemnation of the apartheid regime. Some of us are so weak in that way, and the opposition comes at us with dollars and cents and try to disorganise us in the way we do things, and get us to abandon our principles.
"They target individuals whom they think matter in certain environments, and I was one of them, but there was no way I was going to partake. I would rather have succumbed to relative poverty, but feel proud that I had maintained my morality."
Loss of consciousness
Richards believes that there are two main reasons why West Indies cricket continues to remain in the abyss. The first has to do with the fact that most of the former players who possess that winning mentality, have not been allowed to have the input that they would have liked. The second reason comes down to the present crop of players themselves.
"I structured my whole approach to the game on the legacy of West Indies cricket. That approach wasn't just focused on those players who scored the most runs, or those who took the most wickets, but also on players such as Learie Constantine, who struggled to make it in England and laid a path for the rest of us.
Individuals have now lost most of the consciousness of what playing for the West Indies was all about. You only had to come to England to see what our cricket meant to the West Indians who were working in the bus depots, and all those others who were struggling against the bureaucracy of the system at the time.
"Cricket was a uniting force in our quest for a Caribbean identity." On August 8, 1991, Richards played his final test for the West Indies-amid a whirlwind of emotions coursing through him. And as he was caught out at midwicket and walked towards the pavilion for the final time, all four corners of the Oval in South London got to their feet and applauded, in acknowledgement of the brilliance that they had been privileged to witness for nigh on two decades.
"I had totally accepted that the time had come for me to walk away from the game, but as I walked away, there was a sign hanging from a balcony which said 'Thank You Viv', and it was then that it really hit me. "Too many wait until injuries have come into play, or when they have lost that last series. "But, to step out in total control, knowing that I was able to hand over the job entrusted to me, in the same intact way that Clive Lloyd had given it to me, was very important."
These days, Sir Vivian shares his time between giving something back through his charity work with the Sir Vivian Richards Foundation, and being a representative of the Antigua and Barbuda Tourism Board. It is a true measure of the man, though, that amidst a gathering of international media at the Excel Centre in East London, he still affords ample time to a novice journalist of very little repute. They certainly do not make them like him anymore.