Tony Cozier: the soundtrack to West Indies cricket
Cricket writers from around the world on what Tony Cozier's commentary meant to them
It was Richards batting and Marshall bowling and Dujon taking one in front of slips, and it was Cozier telling it. It was Lara and Ambrose and Walsh and Cozier. Then it was lesser players and leaner times, but it was still Cozier, playing the tune. He described a game and evoked a place. When the West Indies were all the rage, we all fantasised about batting like Viv and bowling like Joel, and we did it in Cozier's accent. Not all who did would have realised then that Cozier was white!
Somewhere in the great celestial radio commentary box my dream team have been assembled. First the deep Basingstoke claret rumble of John Arlott at his poetic best. Next, The Major, Christopher Martin-Jenkins, clipped, eloquent, meticulous in all but timekeeping, and brilliantly, twinklingly precise. And now another. "After a few words from Trevor Bailey it will be Tony Cozier."
Touring teams of the day would always be granted an invitation to his beach house at Conset Bay on the wilder, east coast, where BBQs, beers and beach cricket were non-negotiable. Although he was a trenchant observer of the game, players, present and past, West Indian and English, would always come. Tony did not have an enemy in the game.