Alvin Isaac Kallicharran (born 21 March 1949) is a former

Indo-Guyanese Indo-Guyanese or Indian-Guyanese, are people of Indian origin who are Guyanese nationals tracing their ancestry to India and the wider subcontinent. They are the descendants of indentured servants and settlers who migrated from India beginnin ...

cricket Cricket is a bat-and-ball game played between two teams of eleven players on a field at the centre of which is a pitch with a wicket at each end, each comprising two bails balanced on three stumps. The batting side scores runs by striki ...

er of

Tamil Tamil may refer to: * Tamils, an ethnic group native to India and some other parts of Asia **Sri Lankan Tamils, Tamil people native to Sri Lanka also called ilankai tamils **Tamil Malaysians, Tamil people native to Malaysia * Tamil language, nativ ...

origin who played

Test cricket Test cricket is a form of first-class cricket played at international level between teams representing full member countries of the International Cricket Council (ICC). A match consists of four innings (two per team) and is scheduled to last fo ...

for the West Indies between 1972 and 1981 as a left-handed batsman and right-arm off spinner. Kallicharran was born in

Port Mourant Port Mourant is a town on the Atlantic coast in East Berbice-Corentyne, Guyana. It is the birthplace of the late president Cheddi Jagan as well as many of Guyana's most famous cricketers. Port Mourant was originally a sugar estate. Many residents ...

British Guiana British Guiana was a British colony, part of the mainland British West Indies, which resides on the northern coast of South America. Since 1966 it has been known as the independent nation of Guyana. The first European to encounter Guiana was S ...

(now

Guyana Guyana ( or ), officially the Cooperative Republic of Guyana, is a country on the northern mainland of South America. Guyana is an indigenous word which means "Land of Many Waters". The capital city is Georgetown. Guyana is bordered by the ...

), where he started playing street cricket until his professional debut as captain of the under-16 Guyana team in 1966 and his first class debut in 1967. He was a ''

Wisden ''Wisden Cricketers' Almanack'', or simply ''Wisden'', colloquially the Bible of Cricket, is a cricket reference book published annually in the United Kingdom. The description "bible of cricket" was first used in the 1930s by Alec Waugh in a ...

'' Cricketer of the Year for 1983. He was part of the 1975 and 1979 teams that won the Cricket World Cup. His highest score is 187 against India in the 1978–79 tour. He also found success with

Warwickshire Warwickshire (; abbreviated Warks) is a county in the West Midlands region of England. The county town is Warwick, and the largest town is Nuneaton. The county is famous for being the birthplace of William Shakespeare at Stratford-upon-Avon an ...

in English County cricket. While playing against

minor county The National Counties, known as the Minor Counties before 2020, are the cricketing counties of England and Wales that do not have first-class status. The game is administered by the National Counties Cricket Association (NCCA), which comes unde ...

Oxfordshire Oxfordshire is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in the north west of South East England. It is a mainly rural county, with its largest settlement being the city of Oxford. The county is a centre of research and development, primarily ...

in the 1984 one day

Natwest Trophy The Friends Provident Trophy was a one-day cricket competition in the United Kingdom. It was one of the four tournaments in which the eighteen first-class cricket, first-class counties competed each season. They were joined by teams from Scott ...

he scored 206 and took 6 for 32. One of his most noted international innings, a knock of 158 against England, was shrouded in controversy when he was run out by

Tony Greig Anthony William Greig (6 October 194629 December 2012) was a South African-born Test cricket captain turned commentator. Greig qualified to play for the England cricket team by virtue of his Scottish parentage. He was a tall () all-rounder w ...

on the final ball of the second day. After the ball had been defended and Kallicharran had started to walk off, Grieg threw down the stumps at the non-striker's end, running him out. After negotiations off the pitch, England withdrew their appeal, allowing Kallicharran to continue the next morning. He attempted to join

World Series Cricket World Series Cricket (WSC) was a commercial professional cricket competition staged between 1977 and 1979 which was organised by Kerry Packer and his Australian television network, Nine Network. WSC ran in commercial competition to establishe ...

, but failed, and was appointed captain of the West Indies in 1977–1978 when

Clive Lloyd Sir Clive Hubert Lloyd (born 31 August 1944) is a Guyanese-British former cricketer who played for the West Indies cricket team. As a boy he went to Chatham High School in Georgetown. At the age of 14 he was captain of his school cricket team ...

resigned over the

Kerry Packer Kerry Francis Bullmore Packer (17 December 1937 – 26 December 2005) was an Australian media tycoon, and was considered one of Australia's most powerful media proprietors of the twentieth century. The Packer family company owned a controlling ...

issue. Kallicharan was later involved in further controversy when he led an unofficial

rebel tour The South African rebel tours were a series of seven cricket tours staged between 1982 and 1990. They were known as the rebel tours because the international cricketing bodies Sporting boycott of South Africa, banned South Africa from competitiv ...

to South Africa in defiance of the

Gleneagles Agreement In the Gleneagles Agreement, in 1977, Commonwealth presidents and prime ministers agreed, as part of their support for the international campaign against apartheid, to discourage contact and competition between their sportsmen and sporting organi ...

and anti-

apartheid Apartheid (, especially South African English: , ; , "aparthood") was a system of institutionalised racial segregation that existed in South Africa and South West Africa (now Namibia) from 1948 to the early 1990s. Apartheid was ...

protesters in that country who asserted that official sporting structures were discriminatory. He saw out the rest of his career playing for

Orange Free State The Orange Free State ( nl, Oranje Vrijstaat; af, Oranje-Vrystaat;) was an independent Boer sovereign republic under British suzerainty in Southern Africa during the second half of the 19th century, which ceased to exist after it was defeat ...

and

Transvaal Transvaal is a historical geographic term associated with land north of (''i.e.'', beyond) the Vaal River in South Africa. A number of states and administrative divisions have carried the name Transvaal. * South African Republic (1856–1902; af, ...

in South African domestic cricket.

Family

His brother

Derek Derek is a masculine given name. It is the English language short form of '' Diederik'', the Low Franconian form of the name Theodoric. Theodoric is an old Germanic name with an original meaning of "people-ruler". Common variants of the name ar ...

played first class cricket for Guyana and later the United States of America. His nephews,

Mahendra Nagamootoo Mahendra Veeren Nagamootoo (மகேந்திர வீரன் நாகமுத்து) (born October 9, 1975) is a former cricketer for Guyana and the West Indies and of Tamil Indo-Guyanese ethnicity. In 2005, Nagamootoo took the most ...

and Vishal Nagamootoo, are also cricketers. Presently, Kallicharran lives with his wife, Patsy, and is involved in coaching cricket among youth at Triangle Cricket League in Morrisville,

North Carolina North Carolina () is a state in the Southeastern region of the United States. The state is the 28th largest and 9th-most populous of the United States. It is bordered by Virginia to the north, the Atlantic Ocean to the east, Georgia and So ...

. He was awarded the

British Empire Medal The British Empire Medal (BEM; formerly British Empire Medal for Meritorious Service) is a British and Commonwealth award for meritorious civil or military service worthy of recognition by the Crown. The current honour was created in 1922 to ...

in the 2019 New Year's Honours List for services to cricket and charity. In 2019, he was a mentor for

Puducherry Puducherry or Pondicherry may refer to: * Puducherry (union territory), a union territory of India ** Pondicherry, capital of the union territory of Puducherry ** Puducherry district, a district of the union territory of Puducherry ** Puducherry t ...

men's and women's cricket teams.

References

External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Kallicharan, Alvin 1949 births Living people Cricketers at the 1975 Cricket World Cup Cricketers at the 1979 Cricket World Cup West Indies One Day International cricketers West Indies Test cricketers West Indies Test cricket captains Cricketers who made a century on Test debut Guyanese cricketers Free State cricketers Queensland cricketers Gauteng cricketers Warwickshire cricketers Berbice cricketers Wisden Cricketers of the Year Herefordshire cricketers Shropshire cricketers Guyana cricketers Indo-Guyanese people Guyanese Hindus Sportspeople from Georgetown, Guyana Sportspeople of Indian descent Guyanese cricket coaches