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Clyde Butts - most prolific wicket-taker in regional cricket by Gladstone Critchlow

Clyde Godfrey Butts became the most prolific wicket-taker in West Indies regional cricket when he had John Eugene caught by Roger Harper in the Red Stripe Cup match against the Windward Islands at Queen's Park, St. George's, Grenada (14-17 Jan 94), to reach 257 wickets, surpassing Ranjie Nanan's 256. Butts made his Shell Shield debut against Trinidad & Tobago at Bourda in 1981, taking the wicket of the West Indies middleorder batsman Larry Gomes as his first scalp. Butts took 3 for 60 in the match but did not play against Jamaica at Albion, Berbice in the next match when Roger Harper returned to the side. His first five wicket haul was against the Combined Islands at Queen's Park, St. George's in 1981. He went on to take five or more wickets in an innings on 20 occasions and 10 wickets in a match once, when he took 5 for 113 and 5 for 40 against the Leeward Islands at the Recreation Ground, St. Johns, Antigua in 1985. He took seven wickets in an innings on three occasions with 7 for 29 against the Windward Islands at Castries, St. Lucia in 1992 as his best performance. Butts took 138 wickets in the Shell Shield tournament and 113 in the Red Stripe Cup at the end of the 1993 season. He took his 100th wicket against Trinidad in 1986 and his 200th against the Windwards in 1991. Clyde Butts had his good moments in regional cricket as well as his bad periods. Of the 89 innings in which he bowled he got no wickets in only nine of them and only once in an entire match of two innings against Jamaica in 1992 did he bowl without getting any wickets. He has such excellent analyses as 21-10-30-0, 32-16-33-1 and 17- 8-14-3 against Trinidad & Tobago; 20-7-30-2 against the Windward Islands as well as 31-17-40-3 and 53-17-86-5 against Barbados. Butts conceded over 200 runs once in his career when against the Leeward Islands at Albion, Berbice in 1982 he bowled 65-12-203-4 in the second innings. In fact Butts bowled 98 overs in the match for 281 runs taking nine wickets in the process. The table below analyses the number of wickets he has taken against each territory to the end of the 1993 season and how he took them. He is not yet 37 and with at least two more regional seasons he can get to 300 wickets which will stand as a record for some time and he is likely to take 50 wickets against both Barbados and Jamaica

Overs Mdns Runs Wkts B C St LBW Windwards 515.5 162 988 68 15 42 3 8 Leewards 552 118 1390 55 8 45 0 2 Trinidad 521.3 144 1152 53 11 35 2 5 Barbados 429.3 120 902 36 6 27 1 2 Jamaica 434.2 106 938 31 5 23 3 0 Comb. Isl. 42.5 9 104 8 1 5 2 0 Total 2496 659 5474 251 46 179 11 17