Cricketing Legend Visits Star Stile
By Callum Hansey
Halstead Cricket Club was graced by the visit of one of the greatest cricketers or all time, Sir Garfield Sobers, on Monday.
Sir Garfield watched on as Halstead’s youngsters trained and played an Under 13 fixture against Colchester before regaling lucky club members with tales of his illustrious career.
Sobers was in Essex to promote cricket tours to his home island of Barbados and visited Felsted School and it was through this connection that the great West Indian visited Halstead.
After the training session had ended, the veteran of 93 Test Matches - who was knighted for services to cricket in 1975 – told of his mammoth maiden test hundred, 365 not out against Pakistan at Sabina Park, Jamaica in 1958.
On breaking Len Hutton’s record for the highest test score at the time, “I never thought about the record, I was just delighted to get my first 100. Clyde [Walcott] told me after I got 300 that I needed 64 for the record”
“Six 6s was never on my mind, I never thought of it until I’d got 5. I got so far and thought I might as well do it…I knew what Malcolm Nash [the unlucky bowler] was going to do [with the final delivery] and I just went with it”
The Barbadian emphasised the importance of hard work and practise to the assembled Halstead youngsters.
“The nets are where you learn, not in the middle, that is where you go to execute it”
“You see a lot of cricketers go in the nets and play around because they know they can’t get out. You don’t get runs in the nets, you go in there to learn.”
“No one worked harder than me on a cricket field.”
Chairman Mark Surridge, who put together the evening, was delighted with the experience.
“The great man was in his element, with a fund of amazing memories and I could see the focus and concentration in the eyes of every one of our young lads”
“There was no end of good advice on the importance of nets and practice, listening to those who have played the game before and hard work”