Sir Frank Worrell the greatest of them all

Before he became a “Sir,” Frank Worrell used to give real, real trouble.
Imagine a contemporary West Indies cricketer, in his very first year in the regional side, refusing, on his own, to go on a tour because he wasn’t being paid enough. Think about a star player of the modern era leaving his homeland and making it public that he was doing so because of the narrow-mindedness and insularity, not just of the ordinary folk, but of the influential, privileged class who were doing very little to promote Caribbean integration, politically as well as socially.
Consider for a moment what would be the reaction if a nation, swept up in the euphoria of a significant achievement and therefore a sense of its own importance, were to be openly admonished for their imminent expression of chronic short-sightedness by a former West Indies cricket captain living in another island.
Frank Worrell was a rebel, but with a cause. That cause was not merely the unity and strength of the West Indies on the cricket field but, infinitely more importantly, the unity and strength of the territories of the then British West Indies. That he was able to further that objective through his inspirational leadership of a collection of talented cricketers and laid the foundation for the unprecedented dominance of the West Indies that was to follow (under him, then Garfield Sobers, then Clive Lloyd, then Viv Richards) makes him, surely without question, the greatest West Indies cricketer ever.
In the midst of this 500th Test, a so far tedious and thoroughly uninspiring affair at the Beausejour Stadium here in St Lucia, it is almost too easy to lapse into a lengthy lament over what has become of the legacy of Worrell, of George Headley before him and the more recent all-conquering force spearheaded by the likes of Andy Roberts, Malcolm Marshall and Curtly Ambrose.
But no. Not today. Let us appreciate Worrell in the little space that remains, not through my words, but more authoritative sources who recall a moment of history when one cricketer, a fine exponent in his own right (he had a batting average of 49.48 from 51 Tests and 54.24 in 208 first-class matches) played a pivotal role, not only in reviving Test cricket at a time when the game was as tedious as what we’ve been enduring in this series against Bangladesh, but in the gradual disintegration of a racist mindset and a racist policy of an entire nation.
When the West Indies arrived in Australia at the end of 1960 under the leadership of their first fully-appointed black captain, that nation’s immigration system was governed by legislation loosely described as the “White Australia Policy.” As the Australian Prime Minister during World War II, John Curtin, stated: “This country shall remain forever the descendants of those who came here in peace in order to establish in the South Seas an outpost of the British race.”
In its commemoration of the 40th anniversary of that historic 1960/61 series, the Australian Broadcasting Corporation produced a television series entitled Calypso Summer. The narrative on the ABC’s website in support of the programs is informative:
“The Australian public embraced the visiting West Indian cricketers and took them to their hearts...the social significance of this reaction, is that this support and affection for a team of predominantly black cricketers, occurred in an era when the ‘White Australia Policy’ was still in existence...the West Indian players speak about their experiences in Australia and the fact that they were accepted and loved wherever they went, and that the colour of their skin was never an issue.”
And here’s the critical point: “Opponents of the ‘White Australia Policy’ used the Australian public’s adoration of the West Indian cricketers as a signal that the time was ripe for change and more enlightened national policies dealing with issues of race and immigration.”
And that’s not all.
When it was all over, tied Test, thrilling battles, exciting cricket and all, the West Indies, in a land where non-whites were not particularly welcome, were given an unprecedented send-off:
“Two days later, over 500,000 people crammed into the city streets of Melbourne to farewell the West Indies team. The honour of such a tickertape farewell was unprecedented...Here we had a team of predominantly black cricketers, in a country whose laws at the time would not permit them to be accepted as citizens, the team that actually lost the series, being accorded a hero’s farewell, a parade fit for Presidents, Prime Ministers and film stars.
“One newspaper headline read ‘THEY LOST THE SERIES BUT THEY WON AUSTRALIA’.”
And Frank Worrell, before the knighthood, was central to all of that. As a cricketer, as a man of the Caribbean, he was unique—the greatest of them all.
By Fazeer Mohammed
FIRST PUBLISHED IN TRINIDAD EXPRESS