For one reason or another, and with proper justification, Courtney
Walsh has been a shining light in the gloom that has continued to
envelop West Indies cricket this past year.
The game's oldest Test player will again be the centre of emotional
attention over the next few days at Sabina Park, in his native
Kingston, as he comes to the end of the longest and most celebrated
career of any West Indian cricketer.
And Walsh expressed one wish yesterday.
It would be nice to have a Test match win here in Jamaica for the
final Test match, he said. I'm hoping for that and I am still very
optimistic.
Optimistic rather than realistic, given the West Indies have now gone
13 Tests without winning one.
Walsh's first Test was marked by an innings victory for the West
Indies over Australia at the WACA in Perth in 1984. It would be a
fitting finale should his last produce a similar result.
Back then, he joined statistically and actually the strongest West
Indies team of all. Success came as a matter of course.
He leaves arguably the weakest of West Indies team but, as he noted
yesterday, it remains in the rebuilding process.
When Walsh, 38, walks from the ground for the last time in the fifth
and final Test, he will wave a poignant farewell to the assembled
thousands and take his leave after more Tests than any other West
Indian, and any other fast bowler (132).
He would have added to his incredible tally of 513 wickets, having
already extended the record for most Test wickets he broke with his
435th against Zimbabwe to emotional scenes at Sabina just over a year
ago.
Such occasions have become commonplace for Walsh since. There were
heartfelt farewells from English and Australian crowds and players at
the Oval and the Sydney Cricket Ground as he made his way off those
ground for the last time.
A month ago, he crowned the 50th Test match at the Queen's Park Oval
with his 500th Test wicket, a cricketing Everest. In Guyana, Trinidad
and Tobago and Barbados he has been decorated with high national
honours.
And now Sabina comes around again.
Walsh has given retiring thought more than once before. This time, he
knows within himself that it is time to go, that, if his bowling
remains the highest quality, his fielding is not.
Basically, I was looking for this to be my last Test match and nothing
has happened to change that at this point in time.
All Courtney Walsh wants is a victory to see him out. Is that too much
to ask?