He was over 10 years younger than me, but the prospect of meeting him at his home in Barbados on August 15, 2019, made me feel as excited and exuberant as a youth who would be meeting his idol for the first time.
And the actual meeting with Sir Everton Weekes at 4 pm on that day, made my mind rewind to 1948 when as a 10-year-old I watched with awe Weekes' masterly 128, which helped rescue West Indies from a precarious 27 for three at Feroze Shah Kotla.
While bidding sayonara after a 45-minute meeting that is still "very alive" in my mind, I presented him a bronze statue of Buddha, the proponent of peace. He thanked me for my friendly gesture. As we shook hands to say “Goodbye", I recalled his rearguard action of 1948 and with a "dreamy smile", he said, “Yes! I remember.”
It is with a heavy heart and tears in my eyes that I pen this article as the mortal remains of the last of the famous Calypso Three Ws (Frank Worrell and Clyde Walcott being the other two) who went into oblivion on July 1, 2020. But his exploits on the cricket field will ever remain immortal.
Thus two August 15s are strongly etched in my memory - August 15, 1947, when India broke away from the shackles of the British Empire and August 15, 2019, when I had the nostalgic meeting with one of the West Indies greats at his home in Barbados.
There was an air of uncertainty about the meeting even as I landed at the Grantley Adams International Airport in Barbados. Weekes had suffered a heart attack in June and was under intensive care treatment. But to my pleasant surprise, a smiling Safiya Patel of the Indian Consulate told that my appointment with Weekes was confirmed at 4 pm.
The news was like a whiff of fresh air as my car made way towards my hotel. After a working lunch and brief rest, my cheerful chauffeur Duncan drove me right to his Christ Church located bungalow. My excitement grew as I saw Weekes standing on his porch to greet me with words, "Yes, you are in the right place."
He welcomed me with the Brew House Mahogany Bay Stout beer to make me feel at home. He was surprised to see his 1948 picture of Kotla Test coming down from the Willingdon pavilion stairs with Gerry Gomez. At close to 95 years of age on that day (August 15, 2019), his mind was literally meandering as he recalled memories of his contemporary Indian players.
Looking into the distance as if envisioning the past, he said, "(Lala) Amarnath was haughty, (Vijay) Hazare was gentle in nature and a competent batsman."
He then went on to praise the batting of (Rusi) Modi and (Mushtaq) Ali. Among bowlers, he found Dattu Phadkar, a good fast bowler who resorted to a bouncer war at Madras for which India paid dearly.
"(Vinoo) Mankad was a mean customer," he said but did not elaborate as he stuttered to remember the name of a tall fast bowler who played in the final Test at Bombay, I reminded him it was Shute Bannerjee.
He said, “Ah, he bowled pretty fast and took some wickets (five)." Asked about the time-wasting tactics of the Windies to deprive India of a win in the last Test at Bombay, he brushed it aside, saying, “It’s all part of the game.”
After munching on some snacks, our conversation shifted to the 1953 Indian tour of West Indies. Weekes had a sparkle in his eyes as he said, “It was a very friendly series. Both captains (Jeff) Stolmeyer and (Vijay) Hazare never allowed any match to take an ugly turn.”
It was a high-scoring series where (Polly) Umrigar, (Vijay) Manjrekar, (Pankaj) Roy and (Madhav) Apte made some useful scores, but Umrigar was the toast of Indian batting. It was sad to see Hazare not making any worthwhile contribution. He marked out Subash Gupte as the most dangerous spinner faced by him. A team known for dropping catches by dozens was surprisingly commended by Weekes for its fielding where he praised Umrigar, Gaekwad (Datta) and Gadkari (Chandru) for their agility.
When reminded about our 1994 meeting at Ahmedabad, he again looked at the ceiling as if he was gazing away to recall the past and said, “Yes! I was Match Referee and we went together for celebrations with your friends.”
I reminded him that my friends had arranged a dinner to felicitate me on completing three decades in the commentary box, but he was lost in his own world of nostalgia.
Weekes joined Walcott and Worrell as a formidable batting trilogy in the West Indies team. It was queer destiny that trio was born within a couple of miles of one another. There was another strange coincidence that they were delivered by the same midwife - within 18 months in Barbados between August 1924 and January 1926. To stretch quirk further, the trinity made their Test debuts within three weeks in early 1948.
Weekes was born into paramount penury, forcing the family to live in a wooden shack while his father worked in Trinidad to enable the family to make both ends meet. He left school at 14 without passing any exam. Nevertheless, he successfully studied hotel management later and focused on playing cricket and football for Barbados.
During his formative years, he helped the ground staff at Kensington Oval and even went on to step onto the field as a substitute fielder. It ensured free entry to the cricket venue and chance to watch leading international cricketers closely.
While the troika emerged outstanding batsmen, Worrell became West Indies' first coloured captain and was later a senator in Jamaica. On the other hand, Walcott averaged 56.68 in Test cricket and subsequently became the first non-white chairman of the ICC. Finally, Weekes was regarded arguably, the best batsman of the triad. Weekes's five Test centuries in consecutive innings is a Test record, erasing the record previously held by Jack Fingleton and Alan Melville. Weekes had a Test batting average of 82.46 and had passed 1,000 Test runs in his twelfth innings, one fewer than Donald Bradman.
The nomenclature "Three Ws" was coined by an English journalist during the 1950 West Indian tour of England. After their retirement from cricket, the three remained close and, on the death of Worrell in 1967, Weekes acted as one of the pallbearers at his funeral.
The three Ws Oval, situated on the Cave Hill campus of the University of the West Indies was named in their honour, and a monument to the Three Ws is opposite the Oval where Worrell and Walcott are buried. The possibility of Weekes finding his resting place nearby is not ruled out.
Weekes feats are difficult to emulate and in years to come, they might even be difficult to believe. Such are his achievements that people could even doubt the veracity of his existence and finally wonder that Everton Weekes was perhaps "A Midsummer Nights’ Dream" long ago. Amen!
Dr. Ravi Chaturvedi
Conferred PhD on Cricket - Thesis Known & Unknown Facets of Cricket, Nov. 2019