Viv Richards: How did he perform against the West Indian quicks?

The King on the move: there has been only one Viv Richards © Getty Images

Eye-witnesses often swear by Viv Richards. For them, he was the most menacing batsman of his era, and for many the greatest since Don Bradman. Abhishek Mukherjee analyses his performances against quality pace.

There was a reason they referred to Viv Richards as King. The swagger to the crease, the calm, ruthless machismo with the bat in hand, biceps bulging from shirts too tight to contain them, a glare that often sent a chill down the spine of the bowler, the rhythmic, waiting chewing of the gum — they all killed the bowler psychologically even before the first ball was delivered. The battle was half won by the time he started the run-up.

Richards was special, and that is an understatement. Despite the greatness of his contemporaries (Greg Chappell, Sunil Gavaskar, and Javed Miandad, to name three) Richards’ impact has been the most. None of the others intimidated bowlers to the extent King Viv did: it needs an eye-witness to describe his feats.

A question commonly asked by fans, however, is: how good was Viv against fast bowling? Was he as good when it came to handling a pace battery consisting of four fast bowlers the way his contemporaries had to? How would he have fared against the likes of Andy Roberts, Michael Holding, Joel Garner, Colin Croft, and most significantly, Malcolm Marshall?

Let us find out. After all, he did take him on at domestic level.

Against the fast bowlers

How good was Viv in West Indian domestic cricket? How did he do against the champions of West Indies? Richards played First-Class cricket for Combined Leeward and Windward Islands (26 matches) as well as Leeward Islands (28 matches). How did he do in these outings?

	M	R	Ave	100s
Combined Leeward and Windward Islands	26	1,661	35.34	5
Leeward Islands	28	1,669	45.11	4
First-Class cricket in West Indies	54	3,330	39.64	9

[Note: Some of these matches were played against touring sides.]

That does not look too encouraging, does it? But then, how had Richards’ contemporaries fared in West Indies against their fearsome fast bowlers? Let us go through this excellent research from Arunabha Sengupta for further details. Here is a list of batsmen against West Indies in West Indies:

Batsman	M	R	Ave	100s
Steve Waugh	6	461	76.83	1
Mohinder Amarnath	6	697	63.36	2
Wasim Raja	5	517	57.44	1
Michael Atherton	5	510	56.66	2
Allan Border	10	796	53.06	1
Majid Khan	5	530	53.00	1
Mark Waugh	9	607	50.58	2
David Gower	9	746	43.88	1
Graham Gooch	11	864	41.14	2
Alec Stewart	9	647	40.43	2

[Note: The list is restricted to batsmen who had scored at least 300 Test runs on West Indian soil. The period considered for analysis is April 21, 1976 to April 29, 1995 apart from eleven Tests played by a depleted side between March 3, 1978 and February 2, 1979.]

Richards’ numbers does not look impressive compared to some others. It is to be noted that Richards almost never faced four quality fast bowlers in the same match, which is something these men had to. Mohinder Amarnath, who seldom got a taste of a fast bowler (let alone four) or bouncy tracks in his home conditions, deserves a special mention here.

Talking of fast bowlers, let us check Richards’ numbers against each opposition:

Opposition	M	I	NO	R	Ave	100s	Fast bowlers
Barbados	13	23	1	601	27.32	1	Keith Boyce, Malcolm Marshall, Joel Garner, Wayne Daniel, Ezra Moseley, Sylvester Clarke, Franklyn Stephenson
Guyana	9	15		658	43.87	2	Colin Croft
Jamaica	11	20	1	661	34.79	3	Michael Holding, Courtney Walsh, Patrick Patterson
Trinidad and Tobago	11	17	2	813	54.20	3	Bernard Julien, Tony Gray, Ian Bishop
Windward Islands	5	7		295	42.14		Winston Davis

[Note: Vanburn Holder, despite being a top-notch performer, was fast-medium.]

Trinidad and Tobago seems to be the only opposition against whom Richards had thrived. It is to be remembered that Andy Roberts, Eldine Baptiste, Winston Benjamin, and Curtly Ambrose were his teammates, which meant that he was spared at least four men. He did not have a good time against Barbados and Jamaica, which have traditionally been the breeding grounds of Caribbean fast bowlers.

Bernard Julien, Tony Gray, and Ian Bishop were fantastic bowlers for Trinidad and Tobago, but there was a catch: Julien’s First-Class career ended in 1982; Gray’s career lasted from 1983 to 1995; and Bishop’s from 1986 to 1999. Unfortunately, both Gray and Bishop were extremely injury-prone, and did not have very long careers in West Indian domestic circuit — but they were still as menacing as any fast bowling pair.

Let us consider another parameter, then: how did Richards perform against the West Indian sides at their dens? Richards had played 25 away First-Class matches on West Indian soil: let us do a match-by-match break-up (the bowlers mentioned above — let us call these “star” bowlers — are marked in red).

Season	Opposition	Ground	Seamer 1	Seamer 2	Seamer 3	Seamer 4	Innings 1	Innings 2
71-72	Windward Islands	Roseau	Norbert Phillip	Grayson Shillingford	David Defoe		20	26
71-72	Jamaica	Sabina Park	Uton Dowe	Cecil Lawson			15	32
71-72	Guyana	Skeldon	Sydney Matthews	Keith Glasgow			23	59
72-73	Barbados	Kensington Oval	Vanburn Holder	Colin Payne	Stephen Farmer		11	52
72-73	Trinidad and Tobago	Queen’s Park Oval	Bernard Julien	Prince Bartholomew			5	0
73-74	Jamaica	Sabina Park	Michael Holding	Uton Dowe			40	7
73-74	Guyana	Rose Hall	Philbert Blair	Keith Cameron			4	78
74-75	Barbados	Kensington Oval	Keith Boyce	Vanburn Holder	Greg Armstrong		13	54
74-75	Trinidad and Tobago	Queen’s Park Oval	Bernard Julien	Prince Bartholomew			14	10
76-77	Barbados	Kensington Oval	Joel Garner	Vanburn Holder	Stephen Farmer		124	45
79-80	Jamaica	Sabina Park	Ray Wynter	Clement Thomson			1	0
79-80	Barbados	Kensington Oval	Joel Garner	Malcolm Marshall	Sylvester Clarke		0	3
80-81	Trinidad and Tobago	Queen’s Park Oval	Alec Burns	Eric Audain			168*	1
80-81	Barbados	Kensington Oval	Malcolm Marshall	Sylvester Clarke	Wayne Daniel	Hartley Alleyne	4	13
81-82	Windward Islands	Roseau	Winston Davis	Norbert Phillip			92	1
81-82	Jamaica	Sabina Park	Courtney Walsh	Ray Wynter			73	50
82-83	Barbados	Kensington Oval	Malcolm Marshall	Wayne Daniel	Hartley Alleyne	Neal Phillips	0	45
85-86	Jamaica	Sabina Park	Michael Holding	Courtney Walsh	Patrick Patterson	Aaron Daley	2	5
85-86	Guyana	Bourda	Collie Solomon	Mark Grenville			32
87-88	Barbados	Kensington Oval	Malcolm Marshall	Joel Garner	Victor Walcott		70
89-90	Barbados	Kensington Oval	Ezra Moseley	Franklyn Stephenson	Sam Skeete	Anthony Johnson	25*
89-90	Jamaica	Sabina Park	Courtney Walsh	Patrick Patterson			16	17
90-91	Trinidad and Tobago	Queen’s Park Oval	Ian Bishop	Tony Gray			12
90-91	Windward Islands	St George’s	Cameron Cuffy	Ian Allen	Wesley Thomas	Neil Williams	73
90-91	Guyana	Bourda	Barrington Browne	Calvin Belgrave			0

Indeed, barring the 124 and 45* against Garner at Kensington Oval, Richards has seldom played a quality innings with even one “star” bowler at their den. His other hundred, 168*, came against two seamers who were not quite regarded as “stars.”

Let us now do a break-up of Richards’ away career on West Indian soil:

	M	I	NO	R	Ave	100s
Away career on West Indian soil	25	44	2	1335	31.79	2
Against three away “star” seamers	3	6		27	4.50
Against two away “star” seamers	5	7	1	185	30.83	1
Against one away “star” seamers	7	14		528	37.71
Against no away “star” seamer	10	17	1	595	37.19	1

But then, there was the County Championship in England (where he had always thrived — albeit under different conditions), where Richards scored 17,548 runs for Somerset and Glamorgan at 49.43 with 55 hundreds. But the question remains: did he ever have to play four, even three, or even two West Indian fast bowlers at the same time, even in the Championship?

Let us check the counties the “star” seamers played for:

County	Fast bowler 1	Fast bowler 2	Fast bowler 3
Lancashire	Croft (77, 78, 80, 82)	Holding (81)	Patterson (84-90)
Northamptonshire	Davis (87-90)	Baptiste (91)	Ambrose (89-96)
Derbyshire	Holding (83, 85-89)	Bishop (89, 90, 92)
Glamorgan	Davis (82, 83, 84)	Moseley (80, 81, 86)
Gloucestershire	Stephenson (82, 83)	Walsh (84-87, 89, 90, 92-94, 96, 98)
Hampshire	Roberts (74, 75, 77, 78)	Marshall (79, 81-83, 85-87, 89, 90, 92, 93)
Kent	Julien (71-75, 77)	Baptiste (81-87)
Essex	Boyce (68-77)
Leicestershire	Roberts (81-84)
Middlesex	Daniel (77-88)
Nottinghamshire	Stephenson (88-91)
Somerset	Garner (77-79, 81-83, 85, 86)
Surrey	Gray (85-87, 90)
Sussex	Stephenson (92-95)

[Note: Garner played alongside Richards for Somerset.]

It is to be noted that Richards played in the County Championship for Somerset (1974, 1975, 1977 — 1983, 1985, and 1986) and for Glamorgan (1990 — 1993).

The only seasons when two West Indian fast bowlers played for the same county were:

- 1989, when Holding and Bishop both played for Derbyshire. Richards did not play that season.

- 1989, when Davis and Ambrose both played for Northamptonshire. Richards did not play that season.

- 1990, when Davis and Ambrose both played for Northamptonshire. Richards played one match against them that season, in which Davis did not play.

There is no real need to elaborate any further. The numbers do the talking.

(Abhishek Mukherjee is the Editor and Cricket Historian at CricketCountry. He blogs here and can be followed on Twitter here)