mid-day Opinion: This King is 75 today

West Indies’s Collis King clubs a delivery from an England bowler to the fence during his innings of 86 in the World Cup final on June 23, 1979; (below) Collis King in 2007. PICS/MID-DAY ARCHIVES

While the sporting globe is in World Cup mode - be it with the women's T20 cricket or the men's football extravaganza - a World Cup hero turns 75 today. His name: Collis Llewellyn King. His claim to ODI cricket fame: A 66-ball 86 for West Indies in the 1979 World Cup final against England at Lord's (yes, the same venue now in the throes of pitch infamy).

King, who was also part of Clive Lloyd's 1975 World Cup-winning squad without getting a game, walked in to bat on June 23, 1979, with West Indies shaky at 99-4. At the other end was Viv Richards, who ended up making his one and only World Cup final century. But pundits believed that it was King's innings (77 minutes, 10x4, 3x6) that stuck deeper in memory and admiration.

Australia's 1975 World Cup captain Ian Chappell was in the Blue Mountains range in New South Wales when he watched it on television.

In a pre-1996 World Cup interview with Harsha Bhogle, Chappell recalled: "What I remember most was Collis Kings's innings. I was barracking like hell for the West Indies as I didn't want to see England win the World Cup. Viv was playing pretty well, but then I remember thinking, gee I'm not sure they are going to get enough and then Collis came in and belted them all over the park."

King's captain Lloyd dwelled glowingly about the knock in Living for Cricket. It was Lloyd who King replaced at the crease. "I do not think any bowler would have bothered King in the mood he was in that day.

He cracked the ball like thunder to all parts of the ground while Richards, at the other end, carried out the supporting role admirably. King plays his cricket as he lives his life. He is a human dynamo, full of energy and non-stop action. His batting may be unorthodox but he has a remarkable eye and incredible strength. By the time he was out for 86, one of the best innings I have seen in a match of this importance, we were 238 for five and I knew the match was ours," wrote Lloyd.

Tony Cozier's West Indies Cricket Annual named King as one of their five cricketers of 1979. In the 1980 edition, Sam Wilkinson wrote: "As King cut [Ian] Botham, drove [Chris] Old and pulled [Wayne] Larkins to all corners of the game's hallowed ground, those excitedly clustered around their transistors at home [in Barbados] would have been reciting tales of similar deeds - of the afternoon, when he scored 202 not out in less than two hours in a Division 1 club match or of the occasion, in the 1978 season, when St Catherine's bowlers, blasted for 258." Interestingly, by 1980, King had played the last of his 18 ODIs and nine Tests for the West Indies. His solitary Test century came against NZ in February 1980 at Christchurch, where he reached his hundred with a six off the last ball of the drawn Test.

The all-rounder's best bowling effort was a match-winning 4-23 at first change against England in a 1979-80 tri-series game at Adelaide.

In 1983, King was part of the rebel West Indies team in South Africa. Among the many headlines he grabbed in South Africa, the one for his match-winning 101 against the hosts in the second ‘Test' at Johannesburg, was most significant.

Under the headline, ‘Clarke [Sylvester] and King, Monarchs of the match' in Calypso Cavaliers by Brian Crowley, a report said: "King's innings was typically West Indian, sometimes lacking a bit in purist technique but all wonderful eye and timing. His most spectacular shot, one which only the Caribbean cricketers appear to attempt, was a back foot drive off the well-pitched up ball through a very wide arc from cover point to almost mid-wicket."

Omar Henry, the former SA player, told me on Wednesday that King was the superstar of that rebel team and he infused new energy in the side. "If he was playing now, he'd be a T20 specialist and you could see that he enjoyed his cricket thoroughly and was happiest among people," Henry said from Scotland.

Barbados-born King has been to India for veterans cricket and we in Mumbai saw him in action during the 1985 World BSI Masters. He didn't get a hit in the final against India which West Indies won, but smashed 79 against SA and 29 against England included one of the biggest sixes hit at the Brabourne Stadium.

King's zest for the game is relentless. "To me cricket is still a sport which I love to play. I know things are different when you're playing for your country in the [Shell] Shield or in a Test, but to be honest, I don't feel my attitude to the game is any different now to when I was at school," King was quoted as saying in the 1980 WI Cricket Annual.

And that explains why he was in SA only the other day to visit friends he had played with in Natal.

mid-day's Deputy Editor Clayton Murzello is a purist with an open stance.
He tweets @ClaytonMurzello. Send your feedback to mailbag@mid-day.com
The views expressed in this column are the individual's and don't represent those of the paper.