Our Test Star Edgar Gilbert

Believe it or not he is the oldest man ever to play for St. Kitts. At age fifty 50 Edgar Gilbert was recalled to the St. Kitts team and it was based on shear performance. In the division 1 Gilbert was still playing for Molineux and collected a lot of wickets. I am not ashamed to say that my wicket was one of them. This was in 1983 after he had made his contribution in his prime between 1960 and 1968 playing in regional cricket and many more years playing for St. Kitts.

Gilbert started as a left arm medium fast bowler playing for Molineux in the 1950’s in the days when almost every community in St. Kitts had a team or two and sometimes 4 as in the case of Sandy Point. In my opinion he was in an ideal position to compare cricket in the 21st century to 50 years ago.

“The standard has dropped a lot from the days when I used to play,” Gilbert said as I sat as the feet of this great man and collected his memories. “I guess the reason for that is that we used to play a lot of cricket, which was the main sport followed by football. Now, the kids have a lot of distractions away from cricket, television and American type sports such as basketball,” Gilbert said.

I guess I can understand their point since cricket is a very hard game. The preparation is tough. Take for instance the Molineux Grounds when we got it. At first it was just a cane field that they cut and gave it to us. We literally had to remove tons of old cane stumps and level the field before we could get a game on it. At one point we started to play on it even before it was completely finished. Sometimes we would be playing and removing stones at he same time,” Gilbert reported.

“Tell me about some of the players and some of the games”. I urged. We had some good players but our problem was one of recognition. In those days unless you were playing in town you were not recognised. I was one of the first players to play in Basseterre and I could recall days when it was extremely difficult for me to get home to Molineux after the game. I can go around the various communities and call names of players who were really good and never really got a chance to play for St. Kitts. The late Ben Phipps was as good any that I have seen as an off spinner. Ernest Fraser form Cayon was a good quickie and Clement Rogers an excellent opening bat (well at least he got a chance to play for St. Kitts) and the list can go on and on.

“We had some very close games but from what I can recall Molineux was the strongest, we won most of the games. Cayon provided the stiffest opposition, I believe the games were shared but Molineux had the edge.”

Gilbert recounted how every weekend there were games in various communities and as the excitement of these grew and challenges were thrown all around, then teams from the Basseterre areas started to join the challenge. The games were so competitive that even when the Basseterre team were not engaged the players would try to align themselves with the various community teams in order to play. And in turn players from the rural areas got invited to play for teams in Basseterre. Ben Phipps eventually played for Renown and I started with St. Christopher. This is how cricket grew in St. Kitts.

Gilbert got recognition in 1960 when he started playing for the Leewards islands and from then on started picking up wickets too many to remember but some stand out. Seymour Nurse of Barbados who had heard of Gilbert’s ability to take wickets sent ahead threats of what he and his bat would do to the Leewards and particularly Gilbert.

“Tell him I say that he got de bat but I got de ball!” was Gilbert response. The end result had the great Seymour Nurse walking back to the pavilion with the sound of the death rattle in his ear after Gilbert had clean bowled him for a low score.

“What was the secret behind taking so many wickets?” I wanted to know. “You see I started off as a medium pacer opening the bowling for Molineux. Then I started spinning and so I developed a surprise ball that I gripped as if I was seaming and it fooled a lot of batmen who were looking for the leg spinner. Many times the extra pace and bounce surprised them and in prodding forward gave the close-in fielders catches. I can recall Hesketh Benjamin taking many catches from my bowling in that manner”. Gilbert said.

Gilbert played against international touring team such as Australia and India and there proved his ability as an all rounder.
In 1965 at Warner Park Gilbert got to 84 against the mighty Australians who were touring the West Indies with Bob Cowper at the helm. Leroy Coury was at the other end. According to Coury Gilbert never really trusted his batting and wanted to get to the 100 in hurry and was out going for a big hit. Coury batting at # 11 made 12.

One of the most memorable games for him was in 1960 when in a regional game he orchestrated the collapse of a Trinidad side chasing an attainable target. Clem John the captain at the time got injured and left the field. The vice captain then put the ball in his hands and from then on wickets started to tumble. “I can recall big men from Trinidad crying longs tears after that game”. Gilbert recounted with a chuckle.

Gilbert nurtured several very good cricketers from Molineux some of whom are among our test stars in Livinston Harris and Noel Guishard. Winston “Way- day” Davis is also in that elite group as he emerged to be an outstanding batsmen and a shrewd captain. “Way Day I can recall having to stand up for him and put down my foot as I was accused of wanting to pick him since he was close to me and from my village. But it wasn’t that I was able to foresee that he was a very good player.” At that time Gilbert was serving as a selector to the national team.

In his latter years Gilbert worked as a cricket coach in the primary schools around St. Kitts.

“I saw a lot of young guys with talent but they simple faded away when they got to the High School. Too many distractions I guess,” he said with a saddened face.

Gilbert is now a double amputee but never misses a game from his vantage point in his wheelchair overlooking the Molineux playing field that was fittingly named after him. From that point he has watched the development of some of Molineux’s next generation of cricketers. Jacques Taylor is the one name so far that stands out.

“I have watched him and he has steadily improved over the years. If he keeps his head on right he can reach far yes he can reach far,” Gilbert concluded.

A Edwards for Caribbean Vybes