Allan Rae dependable enough to average 46.18 in his 15 Tests

Allan Rae was one of the vanishing breed of West Indies Test players who regarded their transition into administration as an undeniable duty. His productive, if brief, Test career as a solid left-handed opening batsman, dependable enough to average 46.18 in his 15 Tests, and his far longer involvement in management that saw him rise to the presidency of the West Indies Cricket Board of Control between 1981 and 1988, coincided with golden eras of West Indies cricket. Yet his administrative roles spanned two of the most contentious issues of the day - the intrusions of Kerry Packer's World Series Cricket in the late 1970s and apartheid-era South Africa in the 1980s. In spite of such challenges, West Indies were never stronger than during his presidency.

Even more than most of his contemporaries, cricket was Rae's life. Son of Ernest, who toured England with West Indies in 1928, Rae made an immediate impact on coming into the Jamaica team in 1947, with hundreds in each innings against Barbados in his second match. He was in London, studying law, when England came to the Caribbean for the first Test series after World War II in 1948 and it was from London that he was summoned for his debut tour of India later that year. Over the next two series, he shared an opening partnership with Jeffrey Stollmeyer, by contrast a tall, stylish right-hander, that brought stability to the top of the order for the first time, setting the foundation for the rapacious Three Ws - Everton Weekes, Frank Worrell and Clyde Walcott - to follow.

In India, Rae scored hundreds at Bombay and Madras and repeated the feat on the historic tour of England the following year when West Indies triumphed in England for the first time. Rae's 106 at Lord's set the early platform for a signal victory at the game's headquarters; his 109 at The Oval helped secure the series. He could not come to terms with the pace of Ray Lindwall, Keith Miller and Bill Johnston on lively pitches on the 1951-52 tour of Australia and played only six more Tests after his zenith in England.