More to Ganteaume than his average
Andy Ganteaume's is not a name numbered among the great West Indies batsmen. His peculiar distinction is based on the instructive circumstances of his exclusion after scoring a hundred in his solitary Test innings, against England in 1948 in his native Trinidad, and, equally bizarrely, his selection on the tour of England nine years later, when he was 36.
Even with West Indies cricket in its constant state of turmoil, it is impossible to imagine such a scenario in the present day. Ganteaume, a black civil servant, was a popular sportsman in Trinidad, a regular player in the national cricket and football teams. Yet he had no players' association to represent his cause, no indignant public to protest on social media, no team-mates to raise a hue and cry on his behalf. That was how it was back when a white hierarchy held sway in every aspect of life in the cricket-playing British colonies; it would only change over the next two decades with the advent of political independence.
"He was a real gentleman and a great friend," Sir Everton Weekes, now the only surviving member from Ganteaume's Test and, 91 on February 26, West Indies' oldest Test cricketer, said on hearing of Ganteaume's passing on Wednesday. "He was never argumentative but would listen to what anyone had to say with understanding, if not necessarily agreement."