Test Profile (Part 1) 1974 - 1983.
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Gordon Greenidge, for 20 years the personification of West Indies
cricket, came to the game from the small English town of Reading. He was
a Hampshire player before anything else and might have played for
England if it were not for a strong feeling for his mother's roots in
Barbados. West Indies were prepared to select him long before England
would have dared. He was still very raw when taken to India in 1974-75,
but had attracted attention by his willingness to try and match his
Hampshire partner, the great South African Barry Richards, stroke for
stroke. He did not yet have the defence, but he was not afraid.
Greenidge repaid West Indies' faith in his first Test match in
Bangalore, when he scored 93 and 107. The other debutant - one Vivian
Richards by name - failed. In Australia in 1975-76 he was dropped after
one Test and Australian grounds were to be his hoodoo until his final
tour there 13 years later. He returned to the Test team in England in
1976, scoring 84 at Lord's, then 134 (out of 211) and 101 on a difficult
wicket at Old Trafford. Next there was 115 at Headingley and 85 not out
at the Oval. In his early career Roy Fredericks was his regular opening
partner, but his alter ego, Desmond Haynes, came along in the late
1970s. Greenidge made 91 and 96 against Pakistan in Guyana, 100 and 82
at Kingston in the same series and 91 and 97 at Christchurch against New
Zealand. He played in three successive World Cups, scoring 55 against
New Zealand in the semi-final in 1975, 106 not out against India at
Edgbaston in 1979 and 105 not out at Worcester against Zimbabwe in 1983.
(Bob Harragan)
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Gordon Greenidge is seen above batting for the West Indies on Thursday June 2nd. 1988.
Photograph George Herringshaw. ©
Test Profile (Part 2) 1984 - 1991.
| Sometime in the middle of his career Gordon Greenidge started to limp.
It was always a dangerous sign. The pain in his leg seemed to make him
concentrate more and the more injured he looked, the less chance there
seemed to be of getting him out. He limped his way through probably his
greatest innings, the 214 not out at Lord's in 1984, when he led West
Indies on a wild run-chase that saw them get 342 to win in less than a
day, only losing one wicket in the process. He made 223 at Old Trafford
in the same series, setting up an innings victory. His 95 in Adelaide
during a 1984-85 tour was his best on several tours 'Down Under' until
his last. He made 100 against New Zealand in Trinidad in 1985 and 213 a
year later in Auckland. There was 141 against India at Calcutta and 103
against England at Lord's in 1988. He was given a taste of captaincy
against Pakistan at Georgetown in 1987-88, but left watchers
unimpressed. Bizarrely, he batted himself at number four, the only time
in his career he was not at the top of the order. Greenidge finally
broke the Australian jinx in his last Test innings there, making 104 at
Adelaide in 1988-89. He made 117 against India in Barbados in 1989 and
149 in Antigua on England's visit in 1990. His last great innings was
his 226 against Australia at Bridgetown in 1991. In the latter half of
his career he missed many ODIs, although his appetite for 'real' cricket
was so far from gone that he even joined the weekend cricketers of the
Barbados Central Club for a tour of the U.K. in 1989. (Bob Harragan) |