A Lesson in Humility

Growing up, my family would often travel to Barbados and we would visit our many, many distant relatives in the parish of St. Andrew. Driving through this lusciously green and still parish we would pass an unassuming stretch of land my mum would point out as the Conrad Hunte Cricket Pitch. Being young, and not particularly interested in cricket, I didn't think much of it.

It wasn’t until this year, watching the England cricket tour of the West Indies, that I started thinking about those trips and the great West Indian cricketers my dad would recall. I got hold of a copy of Sir Conrad Hunte’s autobiography Playing to Win published in 1971. It details his cricketing career as an opening batsman for the West Indies from 1958-1967. During this time he played 44 Test matches amassing 3245 runs at an average of 45.06 - placing him in the annals as one of the best opening batsman for the West Indies, if not of all time.

From the last century until today, cricket has been plagued with politics. The West Indies Cricket Team is no exception. In 1960 Hunte played in the first Windies team to be captained by a Black man, Frank Worrell. His appointment was championed by the historian and cricket commentator C L R James and echoed a rise in the Pan-African Movement that saw many Caribbean islands gaining independence from European nations.