Who Was Lancelot Pierre And What Cut Him In A Different League In The West Indies?

The tale takes us way back in time. Sir Curtly Ambrose wasn’t even born then. Ditto for the great Courtney Walsh. The likes of Ian Bishop and Patrick Patterson perhaps might not even have been names their parents had conceived. And long before they became sort of a nickname conveniently sticking to a generation that seldom cares to dive into the details, when the Windies were still addressed as the West Indies- and with gusto and pride- there was a certain Lance Pierre.

From an island known for producing prominent batters- Joey Carew, Charlie Davis, Larry Gomes, and the one and only Brian Lara– Lance Pierre was an anomaly of sorts.

This was not only from the perspective of the trade he plied in the game but also for his appearance.

The moment you hear the phrase menacing fast bowler, you think of a tall quickie rushing in with brooding intensity and perhaps chiseled physique.

The last thing you could ever think of- unless your imagination is uniquely vivid- is for the pacer adorning glasses.

Can you name five fast bowlers who bowled quick wearing spectacles?

With a not so long run-up to the crease, but a hopping spring in his step, Lance Pierre broke into the West Indies team of the 1950s with rich vigor and at the back of strong performances for his Trinidad team.

Those were marvellous days for playing the sport that was contested in an era that was an absolute stranger to dubious deeds like match-fixing and unsullied by misdeeds like spot fixing.

You know, the foundational days that attributed to Test cricket the potion of purity.

Alas, when compared to the seemingly back-breaking packed schedules of today, the sport was played in limited spurts, that weren’t always bursts of sudden, continued activity.

And Lance Pierre- the lanky pacer from Trinidad and Tobago- arrived like a breath of fresh air, having broken into a team that was power-packed by superlative batsmen.

While everyone wishes to do something, at least, once in the game that will be remembered long after one’s gone. But commanding headlines in the post-war era of the 1950s West Indies team was perhaps as arduous a task as a human locking horns with the bull.

You just didn’t get your chance for the tussle, for the famous 3 Ws of the game- Clyde Walcott, Sir Frank Worrell, and Sir Everton Weekes were already there in the team.

Sadly though, for Lance Pierre, no midget at 6’3, got a chance to feature in his maiden Test in 1948, which would eventually also become his first and final Test appearance for the West Indies.

In a series where the English played helpless visitors in the Caribbean, the Third Test as to have been the breakaway moment for a man clearly labeled as the fastest bowler in the hosts’ side by even the most lauded English pundits.

It wasn’t the Barbadian quick Foffie Williams, but Lance Pierre.

But heartbreakingly so, the versatile John Goddard and John Trim- the famous Johns of the West Indies- were in such beautiful touch that the Test newcomer emerged wicketless from a fast bouncy Bourda pitch under the baking sun.

In all, Lance Pierre bowled 7 overs in the game, with 2 in the first inning and 5 in the next.

He’d cop up injuries soon after, proving vulnerable to constant physical fragilities that hampered a real medium pace talent from surging ahead.

Yet, despite despair at having not being picked again, he’d not lose hope.

And it could be said, Lance Pierre’s finest cricketing moment arrived exactly two years later, but away from the sunny breeze of the Caribbean and in the cold English weather.

In the West Indies tour of England, 1950, a comprehensive visit by the John Goddard-led side, that featured – would you believe it- 28 tour matches, Lance Pierre finally got a chance.

But it was not before the thirteenth tour game, a three-day encounter at the homeland of the Beatles.

And truth be told, facing an opponent featuring the likes of the great Cyril Washbrook (who opened with Len Hutton on a record 51 occasions) and Lancashire legend Winston Place, there was one West Indian who produced divine music- Lance Pierre.

Taking his career-best first-class figures of 8-for-51, Pierre was, at best, bouncy, unpredictable and swingy on a track never made for batting.

Cutting no corners with his rancid medium pace, Lance Pierre’s whole-hearted efforts are telling on those who’d ignored what might have been a glowing addition to the West Indian bowling battery, one that now featured greats in Sonny Ramadhin and Alf Valentine– two of the most unforgettable spinners of their era.

You know you’re something special when you take a five-for when least expected; but you’re something else altogether when you skittle out the first seven wickets of an order leaving no chance, whatsoever, for an otherwise prized bowling attack.

In reply to Lancashire’s 174 all-out, in fact, read mostly out to Lance Pierre, the West Indies hammered 397, Sir Frank Worrell thudding 159 on his own.

Ensuring the follow-on, Pierre pushed back Washbrook catching him plumb in front on an unplayable delivery, ending thus with 9 wickets from the game.

They say fast bowlers are workhorses and their only folly is the constant entanglement to injuries. This aptly describes a promising career that withered away to shoulder and back issues, as surviving data from an era with limited reportage suggests.

But truth be told, in Lance Pierre, maybe the West Indies had someone who could have possibly been the best pacer from Trinidad, where the might is always associated with the bat, not the thunders of the ball.

Though, even in his brief cricketing stint at the first-class level, it didn’t take long for the Trini to collect 102 wickets from a mere 35 games.

Sad part being much like his fading career, there’s hardly any footprint of his prowess available in the crucial realm of our semi-existence- the World Wide Web.

In lighter vein, you’ll fail to even find a high-resolution image of the promising quick unless you put Israel’s Mossad or the CIA on the job.