Andy Ganteaume was much more than an average quiz question

Sixty-eight years ago, Andrew Gordon Ganteaume had played a Test, the only one of his career.

Sixty-eight years ago, Andrew Gordon Ganteaume had played a Test, the only one of his career. He batted only once, scoring 112. As a result, that particular number remained his batting average. His remains the only Test career with a three-digit batting-average — a feat that had eluded Don Bradman, albeit by decimals.

Ganteaume was picked for the second Test of the 1947-48 home series against England. Both sides were in the process of trying out new players. The first Test saw twelve debutants, five from West Indies and three from England. Three of them — Everton Weekes, Clyde Walcott, and Jim Laker — would become legends of the sport. The next Test saw Ganteaume and Frank Worrell make their debuts, along with two Englishmen.

Ganteaume grabbed the opportunity with both hands. After Will Ferguson’s leg-breaks saw England bowled out for 362, Ganteaume and George Carew added 173 for the opening stand. By the time Carew rushed to a hundred, Ganteaume had just reached his fifty.

Weekes played a cameo before Worrell walked out, and the pair went into a shell almost immediately (and inexplicably). Gerry Gomez, the captain, sent out a note, asking them to get on with the strokes. By then Ganteaume had reached his hundred — the first by a Trinidadian in Trinidad. Shortly afterwards, on 112, he holed out to extra-cover.

Jack Robertson’s defiant 133 and two hours of rain ensured a draw for England. West Indies’ target was a mere 141, but they had less than an hour.

Ganteaume never played another Test. The reason cited was his slow batting (22.4 runs an hour). Worrell, the other debutant, had batted at 29.8. The fact that Ganteaume opened batting and Worrell came out at 226 for 2 was forgotten. He was selected out of nowhere for the 1957 tour of England, but did not play a Test.

Fazeer Mohammad thought differently in his column for Trinidad & Tobago Express. He wrote that Ganteaume’s axing had a lot to do with “the considerable influence of the white hierarchy in the colonial British West Indies.” Indeed, you could not drop any of the three Ws, so someone had to be made scapegoat…

A man of a small frame, Ganteaume’s batting centred around solid technique and infallible temperament. Unlike most short men, he thrived on drives, and not cuts and pulls. His First-Class record of 2,785 runs at 34.81 was not spectacular, but it must be remembered that he was a reliable wicketkeeper if needed.

Ganteaume did not like to open batting, but as he later told Peter Roebuck, “in those days West Indian cricket was obsessed with the idea of a keeper opening because his eye was in. Of course it was utter madness.”

So Ganteaume opened, and did not do too badly in a role he clearly resented. He had to score a hundred in order to make his Test debut. The English media criticised his slow batting on a flat wicket “to make a hundred.” Little did they know that to find a Test spot ahead of his white contemporaries, nothing less than a hundred would have worked for Ganteaume.

He lashed back at ‘The Establishment’ in his 2007 autobiography My Story: The Other Side of the Coin. Ganteaume lashed back so hard that Fazeer referred to the tone as “in a manner that would not be out of place were it Luke Skywalker or Han Solo commenting on Darth Vader’s evil ‘Empire’.”

Also prolific in football for Maple Club (where Clifford Roach and Ellis Achong played both sports as well), Ganteaume probably had the talent to represent Trinidad & Tobago in football. He worked in Trinidad Civil Service, coached Maple Club in football, managed the West Indies cricket side, and became a Test selector.

Ganteaume won the Hummingbird Gold Medal in 2010. The Frank Worrell Noble Spirit Award was bestowed upon him the following year.

Esmond Kentish of Jamaica had lived 94 years 201 days. Once he reached 95 years, Ganteaume seemed set for his second hundred — one only Norman Gordon had achieved among Test cricketers — but lived only a few months longer.

Ganteaume was the oldest-lived West Indian Test cricketer. Less than a month before he passed away, WICB finally saw sense and honoured him on his 95th birthday, calling him “one of the patriots of our great game.”

Ganteaume is survived by his three daughters, one of whom works with retarded children, another in land-distribution, while the third is a ballet dancer.

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