India will soon be playing their 100th Test match against West Indies. While it is no longer a rivalry that cricket fans look forward to with bated breath, it is certainly one that has seen some spectacular performances from some of the greatest that have played the sport. And the very first series between the two teams, played in 1948-49 in India, set the tone. It was a series dominated by Sir Everton Weekes, who will forever be remembered for being one of the hardest hitters of the cricket ball and perhaps the most talented of the 3Ws.
I had the privilege of meeting Sir Everton a few times and even though past 80, he still retained the zeal for cricket and was the star attraction at the formal opening of the Kensington Oval. After the program, he took time off to talk to me at length about his own game and India.
With his death anniversary just past, and with India in the West Indies for yet another series, it is relevant to remember and celebrate one of the greatest that played the game.
Here are some excerpts from the conversation:
Boria: Sir Everton, we know India is close to your heart. How do you remember the land you had made yours during the 1948-9 tour with five centuries on the trot?
Sir Everton: How do I remember India? Simply put, I don’t remember much. You must realise, I am not a twenty year old and my memories of playing in India go back well over half a century. India had just achieved independence, and we were all very excited about undertaking this tour. It was the first ever between the two countries, and it was perhaps the best of my life. What pleases me a great deal is that my cricketing accomplishments, which I had managed on that tour, are recorded in books and newspapers of the time and no one can take these away from me.
I must tell you that India was a team I always loved playing against. It had nothing to do with their bowlers. Let me make something clear – [Vinoo] Mankad and company were some of the best I faced in my career. Mankad’s guile and artistry was something that all of us respected and were skeptical of while taking guard in the middle. It was just that I was in form when I played India, and managed to score some valuable runs for my side. In all, I played ten Tests against India, five in the 1948-49 series and five more in the West Indies in 1953. In the first series, I scored (at least the records tell me such) 779 runs from seven completed innings. In 1953, I managed to get 716 runs from eight completed innings. The total tally, of which I had no idea till I was asked to comment on my Indian tryst for this interview of yours, stands at an impressive 1495 runs at an average of 106.78, something I should legitimately be proud of.
Boria: Five consecutive hundreds. Just tell me whatever you remember.
Sir Everton: I had managed to get a hundred against England before we embarked on the tour of India. However, never did I imagine that the 1948 tour of this culturally rich, newly independent land would make me a world-record holder, a record that would stand the test of time for over fifty years. I always played my cricket for satisfaction, and never cared much about records. This was because a lot of us were not coached, and had learnt cricket the hard way. We just watched one or two players and thought we could take a few things out of their books. It was the West Indian way of playing cricket. Cricket, it must be remembered, wasn’t simply a game for us, it was life.
Boria: Tell us a little bit about how it all happened?
Sir Everton: The first Test match of the tour was in Delhi, the nation’s capital, and there was major enthusiasm all round. It was some time in November and I was fortunate to start this historic tour with a century (128), an innings that set the tone for the rest of the tour. This century had given me a lot of confidence and when I played at the Brabourne Stadium in Bombay, one of the best cricket grounds I have played in, I was stroking the ball freely and the 194 that I got was a just reward for my efforts. I followed this up by scoring a century in each innings – 162 and 101 – at Eden Gardens, Calcutta, and still remember the praise the crowd heaped on us at this legendary venue.
After getting these centuries on the trot, I was suddenly aware that history had been made and was determined to continue in the same vein at Madras. However, man proposes and God disposes. When it seemed to me that the century was just a few shots away, I was run-out for 90, the worst possible way of getting out at that score. It would have been my sixth successive Test century.
Boria: Do you regret getting out for 90 or, rather, being wrongly given out for 90 as is said in many record books?
Sir Everton: I don’t regret this incident at all, and in fact, think that getting out on 90 made my world record all the more poignant – ‘Weekes could easily have scored another century’ remained a lament shared by cricket enthusiasts from round the world. What I do remember is that I gave my bat to an Indian journalist at the end of the tour. SK Gurunathan had become a close friend and presenting my heavily bruised bat to him was a pleasure. May be with the bat went my ability to create more world records, though I did not do too badly afterwards.
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