The greatest game of all

When I was young I played a little cricket. Indeed, one of my most precious memories, a memory now more that sixty years old, is of playing for my school third eleven on a rough pitch up at Mount St Benedict in Trinidad and taking five wickets in one eight-ball over with some slow cunning off-breaks which did not turn – they were an early incarnation of the doosra. However, much to my regret, I never became a serious cricketer. I played tennis hard and grew to love the game. And tennis was certainly good to me, filling my life with much pleasure, excitement, challenge and reasonable achievement. It was a game that introduced me to many life-long friends and taught me, I think, a few of life’s important lessons.

And yet always, in my heart of hearts,