The three sporting knights are huddled around a table and reliving old conquests. They are remembering and laughing and at some point the name of Graeme Hick has been thrown into their conversation.
‘He still ducks when he sees Curtly,’ says the middle sir, Sir Richie Richardson, and the eldest, Sir Andy Roberts, is nodding with enthusiastic approval. The youngest, Sir Curtly Ambrose, is ready to come in off his long run.
The big man has been rather quiet until now, smiling silently through this undulating discussion about the way things used to be. About an era spanning 20-odd years across much of the Seventies, Eighties and Nineties when the West Indies were among the most dominant teams in all of sport and these three sirs were kings.
Sir Richie Richardson (left), Sir Andy Roberts (middle) and Sir Curtly Ambrose (right)
Andy Roberts, pictured here in action against Australia in 1975 was one of the rapid bowlers, who struck fear into opposition batsmen playing against the West Indies
It is all a little different these days, as we might see during England’s tour of the Caribbean, which got under way this week, but back then the experience had a tendency to be quite distressing for those facing West Indian cricketers.
And so to 1991 and the arrival of a talented batsman for his England Test debut. By the time the Zimbabwean called Hick had qualified to wear that cap via the length of his residency, he had accumulated a serious amount of hype. More pertinently to this tale, he also had history with the sort of men you would not wish to motivate.
Ambrose, now 58, chuckles as he takes his first strides. ‘You see the Hick story is a funny one,’ he says. ‘When we toured England in 1988 we played Worcestershire. He scored a big hundred against us (172 runs) and he played extremely well. I have to give him that.
‘It was a big attack — myself, Courtney Walsh, Patrick Patterson. It was mostly the Test attack and Hick played so well.
‘I remember the English press thought he would be the greatest thing — they couldn’t wait for him to qualify so he could play.
Curtly Ambrose bowling in his last Test match for West Indies against England in 2000
‘But fast bowlers — we have good memories when we need to. We never forgot that hundred and the way the press was saying he would be the saviour for English cricket. He was there when we came to tour England in 1991 and you know the story.’
The three sirs are grinning. That series was drawn but Hick was thoroughly beaten by one man — in six of the seven innings for which he walked in with his bat, it was Ambrose who sent him back out again.
‘Courtney (Walsh) got him first innings of the first Test and after that I took care of business,’ he says. ‘You know, he was dropped for the final Test at the Oval. I think the England selectors robbed me of two wickets.’
They’re all laughing now.
‘But he was a wonderful player,’ Ambrose says. ‘You can’t score that many runs without being able to play. He had all that pressure to be the man, but the West Indies were the best team in the world.’
Roberts, 70, the forefather of terrifying fast bowlers from the West Indies, chips in: ‘Hick was one of the best catchers I have seen at second slip but he dropped (Shivnarine) Chanderpaul two or three times in Trinidad a few years after. The psychological effect you had on him affected his cricket.’
Ambrose: ‘He was probably thinking ahead about his innings, “How am I going to survive?”’
They are having a great time, these three legends. The heirs to their team, not so much. Not in recent years. Not in Tests.
Sir Andy Roberts, Sir Richie Richardson and Sir Curtly Ambrose all had stellar careers
They are closer to Zimbabwe in 10th than England in fourth for those who care for rankings, and they are heaven and earth away from the period between 1980 and 1995 when the West Indies did not lose a Test series.
These three reached from one end of that golden line to the other — links in a chain that could hold a ship in a storm.
Roberts was called the ‘Hit Man’, cutting through (and cutting up) batsmen for the West Indies between 1974 and 1983, with 202 Test wickets and four of Ian Botham’s teeth to his name.
Richardson, 60, was arguably the finest batsman in the world for a time, and possibly the most flamboyant. He stood guard between 1983 and 1995, the last four as captain, protected only by his reflexes and a maroon gardening hat.
Then there was Ambrose, with those dreads and that tall frame, splintering ash from 1988 to 2000. Truly one of the greats.
They were in London to promote their shared home of Antigua and Barbuda on the 40th anniversary of its independence. But for this chat, very loosely justified by the scheduling of England’s tour of the West Indies, we are talking dynasties and respect and Gooch and Gower and what it was to brutalise the English.
‘Brutalise?’ says Roberts. ‘I am very proud of doing that. You know I have never played a losing Test match against England?’
Ambrose adds: ‘As West Indian people, we exhibit a certain amount of pride and passion. For us it is all about winning. Trying to win every game possible, guys get roughed up in the process!’
Richardson jumps in: ‘At the end of the day, no one wanted to physically hurt anyone. We wanted to play hard but always fair.’
