Tag Archives: Earl Best

Brian Lara on song, cricket connoisseurs the world over agree, is an arresting, cathartic spectacle; it belongs, in the words of CLR James, who does not only cricket know, ‘with the theatre, ballet, opera and dance.’ A Brian Lara pull, right knee lifted high and torso swivelling rapidly but gracefully …

South Africa’s embattled Caster Semenya is black. And she’s a mighty middle-distance runner, having accumulated 30 victories on the trot in the 800m between 2007 and last Friday. The Court of Arbitration for Sport, the sports world highest jurisdiction, last week ruled against the two-time Olympic champion. If she wants …

Columnist Earl Best concludes his series on legendary West Indies and Trinidad and Tobago batsman Brian Lara with an imagined interview with the Prince of Port-of-Spain: Earl Best (EB): Shane Warne calls some of Sachin Tendulkar innings “pretty amazing” and calls some of yours “unbelievable.”  “I think if you wanted …

More than 80 times in his stellar 17-year cricketing career, Brian Charles Lara, Prince of Port-of-Spain, reached 50 runs; today, however, for the first time in his life, he’s reached 50 years. Cricketing 50s are oft-achieved; even for a Prince, a lifetime 50 is unique—in the pristine sense of that …

“This is not a personal attack on my erstwhile journalist/teacher friend, Earl [Best]. It is meant as a critique of his un-researched commentary. “From what one can discern, Earl has an obvious personal issue with Kamla’s declared intent on creating 50,000 jobs, if she becomes PM. On the surface, one …

Twok! Twok! Twok! Twok! Four remarkable, meaty blows that sent Ben Stokes’ balls sailing over the boundary and unexpectedly won the 2016 T20 World Cup for West Indies. So, heeding Ian Bishop’s order, I have remembered the name Carlos Brathwaite. Likewise, clearly, the selectors. Three years after that unforgettable April …

“A man hit a ball in Antigua,” we all remember Superblue singing in 1995, “and it end up in Trinidad on the Promenade, Lara Promenade.” “The ball cross over rivers and seas,” he adds, “in the sky of the West Indies; the ball whistling through the trees like a joyful …

Antigua, 375, April 1994 & 400, April 2004: Scaling Everest… because it is there “Awesome.” For Geoffrey Boycott, the former England opener, a single word suffices. “Amazing,” Ian Botham concurs. “One helluva innings.” “[I]ncredible physical stamina,” gushes David “Bumble” Lloyd, “a beautiful technical innings. Memorable. Magnificent.” It is April 2004, …

“In all,” observes Jon Hotten in The Meaning of Cricket, “he faced 19, 753 balls in Test cricket and another 13,086 in one-day internationals before he retired in 2007. Only 483 of those resulted in his dismissal, so 32,356 did not. “Put differently, just 1.47 per cent of the deliveries …

“A man of genius,” CLR James says, in writing of Garry Sobers, “is what he is, he cannot be something else and remain what he is.” There is another West Indian left-hander, born a generation after Sobers on May 2, 1969, to whom James’ encomium applies unadjusted. Superlatives abound in …

It didn’t take long, did it? Mouth open and ’tory jump out. Not one mouth, four mouth—not counting Dr Ralph Gonsalves who mouth cyar stay close when is West Indies cricket people talking bout. So first, it was Phil Simmons, who has never felt he wasn’t free to speak his …

“You may not think there is anything wrong with all of that,” House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff repeatedly told the Republican members of his committee earlier this week, “but I do.” “All of that” is a longish, itemised list of some of the most egregious actions—not to say ‘crimes’—already …