Enter Thaddeus Michael Findlay

WHEN I FIRST entered the St. Vincent Grammar School at first form Mikey was a few forms ahead of me. He was a member of School House, the house to which I was assigned.

I seem to recall him among the School House athletes at my first Sports Day.

School house had outstanding athletes; among them Lennox John, Oswald Peters and Carl Glasgow.

Mikey, however, was already known as an outstanding goal keeper and wicket keeper. I remember the early comparison with Garnet Niles and the debate as to who was the better wicket keeper. The more I saw of Mikey the more I was convinced that he was the better keeper. No doubt about it, Niles was an excellent keeper, flamboyant and very energetic, diving a lot. In the case of Mikey his timing was so outstanding that he moved and collected the ball without having to dive. Mikey was especially excellent on the leg side. If anyone knew about German Gutter in Troumaca where a playing field was located before making room for a secondary school, one would have known that Mikey had to be a great wicketkeeper.

That’s where he learnt his wicket keeping.

Only once did I remember playing against him since we were both members of School House.

The occasion was a Form cricket competition. I was batting, facing a Fraser-Victor Fraser- I believe, who was from Rockies. He was an offspinner who spun the ball deeply. I moved forward to drive through the Covers, missed it, and Mikey did the rest. Even though I was only in form 3 I joined Mikey among players to be selected for the Inter-Schools tournament to be held in Grenada. I stood a good chance playing both cricket and football, but my batting let me down. I had seen Alfie Roberts play what I believe was his last game for St. Vincent in the Windward Islands tournament. Alfie made a century. He had a stroke where when the ball was short, he would move back, away from the stumps and punch the ball through the Covers. I was so impressed with that stroke that I adopted it, unfortunately without success. In our final practice session, I persisted with it and made a mess of things. I did not make the team. What I remembered most about that tournament, listening to it, was Mikey’s devastation of Grenadian spinner, McLaren, which I believe was his name. Mikey slapped him to all parts of the field in a vicious display of batting. After leaving school I played with Saints under Mikey as captain.

Mikey played for the Windwards from 19651969 and the Combined Islands from 1970-1978, captained both teams at different times. He made the national team at age 17 in 1960 and his test debut on 26th June, 1969 in the second test at Lords. He had visited Australia and New Zealand, October 1968 to March 1969, but did not appear in any of the tests.

He was the first Vincentian since Alfie Roberts to have made the West Indian team, although Alfie would have been listed as being from Trinidad. Mikey played in 10 tests, having replaced Jamaican Jackie Hendricks, at age 25. He played 2 each against England and India, 5 against New Zealand and 1 against Australia. For me, Mikey did not perform as well with the bat as I thought he would have. His highest score was 44 not out. During his 10 year test span he took 19 catches and 2 stumpings. For most of the time Mikey played for the West Indies I was out of country and was only able to get the scores from BBC SPORTS.

I vividly remembered a Barbados-Combined Islands match in 1973 in Bridgetown, Barbados.

Michael Manley in A HISTORY OF WEST INDIES CRICKET writes about it, “In the closing minutes the light was so bad that even the local press was critical.” Barbados defeated the Islands by 4 wickets. In the fading light that Manley mentions I saw Mikey at his best. I cannot remember who the fast bowlers for the Combined Islands were then, but Mikey stood solidly behind the stumps and performed an excellent job so much so that the Barbadian crowd cheered his excellent work. I was truly impressed. Commenting on the 1975 Shell Shield Tournament Manley wrote, “Under the captaincy of the Test Wicket Keeper, Michael Findlay, the Islands played aggressive cricket from the outset….

The Islands, at 24, had only to gain first innings against a comparatively weak Trinidad side to win their first title. Surprisingly, they lost the first-innings points and left themselves needing an outright win if they were to pass Guyana…. When their last pair came together, Findlay and a nineteen-year old pace bowler Gore, they still needed 13 runs to win. Off the last ball of the match young Gore hit Jumadeen, the Trinidadian off-spinner, into the covers and sprinted through two runs to level the scores.

Had they continued to run and lost a wicket, the result under the rules, would have been a tie. Apparently unaware of this, they stood their ground as a result, the match was ruled a draw, leaving the Islands with only two points and Guyana with the Shield” Despite only winning one Tournament the Islands played entertaining cricket.

Mikey featured as captain for many of the games of both Windwards and Combined Islands. Who remembers “Tanti At De Oval” as made famous by Paul Keens Douglas!

• Dr Adrian Fraser is a social commentator and historian