The Indian team is currently touring the Caribbean for a four-Test series against the West Indies and the host board made it a point to take their wishes on the occasion.
The debate on who is the greatest ever cricketer can be unending but Sobers certainly makes a strong claim. Former Indian all-rounder Ravi Shastri has given his verdict.
Many few had an impact on opposition like Sobers, who has numerous records scripted to his name and was the backbone of West Indies side for many years.
During the first game between Rest of the World and England in 1970 at Lord’s, Sobers claimed 6 for 21 and smacked 183.
To Andy Sandham's credit, his name is immortalised and he stands the first man to have scored a triple ton in Tests, a feat that has been achieved only by 23 other men in Test cricket's close to 140 years of history.
The two sporting icons met at Lord's back in 1966 when Sobers was a member of the West Indies side playing England in a Test match.
It is not clear on which day Ali visited Lord’s, but he met the entire West Indian dressing-room.
It is a phase when most of the top Test playing all-rounders are struggling to find a potential all-rounder.
In 1967, at the height of his cricketing prowess and fame, Garry Sobers lent his name to a cricket-based science fiction novel Bonaventure and the Flashing Blade.
Playing his 17th career-Test, Garry Sobers went on to score his maiden Test hundred. The southpaw from Barbados did not stop here, as he had other plans to make the first Test ton all the more special.