ST JOHN’S, An­tigua– For­mer Trinidad and To­ba­go and West In­dies crick­eter Ham­mond Al­lan Fur­longe has been hailed by Crick­et West In­dies (CWI) for his con­tri­bu­tion to crick­et in the re­gion.

Fur­longe, an open­ing bats­man, passed away on Tues­day at the age of 90.

An un­sung hero of Trinidad & To­ba­go crick­et, Fur­longe rep­re­sent­ed the West In­dies be­tween 1955 and 1956 in three Test match­es.

He made his first-class de­but for Trinidad in 1954-55, open­ing the bat­ting with Jef­frey Stollmey­er.

He had a mem­o­rable and event­ful third match, against the tour­ing Aus­tralians—scor­ing 57 and 150 not out, which earned him a place in the team for the fifth Test, where he opened with John Holt and made four and 28.

Ad­di­tion­al­ly, he toured New Zealand with the West In­dies team in 1955-56.

While he failed to score in the sec­ond Test, he re­turned for the fourth Test where he top-scored in the first in­nings with 64 in a to­tal of 145 all out in a low-scor­ing match.

Chief ex­ec­u­tive of­fi­cer at CWI, Chris Dehring re­flect­ed on Fur­longe’s im­pact on the sport.

“Play­ers like Ham­mond Fur­longe were in­stru­men­tal in shap­ing the foun­da­tions of West In­dies crick­et.

“His per­for­mances in the 1950s came at a piv­otal time in our crick­et his­to­ry, as the team was build­ing its iden­ti­ty and con­fi­dence on the world stage,” Dehring said.

His courage, skill, and qui­et de­ter­mi­na­tion helped set the tone for fu­ture gen­er­a­tions of West In­dies crick­eters. We are for­ev­er in­debt­ed to pi­o­neers like him who paved the way with dis­tinc­tion and pride.”

Mean­while, CWI pres­i­dent Dr Kishore Shal­low of­fered his con­do­lences on Fur­longe’s pass­ing.

“I of­fer sin­cere con­do­lences to the fam­i­ly and friends of Ham­mond Fur­longe. He is one of those un­sung he­roes of West In­dies crick­et who served the game at all lev­els for sev­er­al decades.

“Dur­ing his play­ing ca­reer, he was a dy­nam­ic open­ing bat­ter, com­pet­i­tive and tena­cious in his ap­proach to the game,” Shal­low said.

“On be­half of the di­rec­tors, man­age­ment and staff of Crick­et West In­dies and all lovers of West In­dies crick­et, we salute his lega­cy and his con­tri­bu­tion to the game in the Caribbean, and mourn his loss along­side his fam­i­ly, friends and the crick­et-lov­ing peo­ple of Trinidad & To­ba­go and the Caribbean.”

CMC