Sir Clyde Walcott, one of the ‘three Ws’ who empowered West Indian cricket, was the most powerful batsman of his time. In the era before heavy bats became commonplace, Walcott stood out as the most intimidating batsman of his generation. Immensely strong, Walcott stood up and flayed bowling off the back foot, while Everton Weekes pulled and whipped it, and the third member of the triumvirate, Sir Frank Worrell, cut and caressed it. Three great batsmen from one small island in the Caribbean Sea: this was a marvel in itself. For the trio to appear and play at the same time was a miracle, and in the process they raised the West Indies from the rank of also-rans into a power who defeated England and ran Australia close.
The first sign of the feast to come was in 1945–46, when Worrell and Weekes put on 574 for Barbados against Trinidad, a record stand for any West Indian wicket in first-class cricket. All three Ws made their Test debuts in the 1948 home series against England. By the time he had finished in 1960, Walcott had scored 3,798 runs at an average of 56 in his forty-four Tests, with fifteen centuries.
In his early days he was also a wicketkeeper, agile for all his size, and he was able to read the spin of Sonny Ramadhin, as few England batsmen could do. He prefaced today’s era in that he was a ’keeper who could bat, averaging 40 in Tests when he wore the gloves. When he did not, Walcott averaged 66, as high as anybody after Sir Donald Bradman. Such was his versatility that sometimes Walcott took off the wicketkeeping gloves and bowled. He took eleven Test wickets at 37 each, besides fifty-seven catches and eleven stumpings. And to complete the all-round package he became manager of the West Indies World Cup-winning teams of 1975 and 1979, an I.C.C. match referee and the first non-English president of the International Cricket Council.
But it will be as a batsman above all that Walcott will be remembered, his physique mirrored in the glassy, grassless pitches which used to grace the Caribbean islands. His apogee was the 1954–55 series against Australia in the West Indies when he hit five centuries – the first batsman to hit five in a Test series – with an aggregate of 827 runs in the five Tests. Australia had Ray Lindwall and Keith Miller to bowl, too, and to drink with the West Indians after play in those glad, calypso days.
Clyde Leopold Walcott: b Bridgetown, Barbados, 17 January 1926; d 26 August 2006