Larry Gomes

[dr nick]

what are your impressions of this 1980's WI batter?

i never saw him play, but my dad says he was a leg glance and edgey specialist, and he never scored runs in front of square.
just looking through some of his career, its incredible how he held his place regularly in the side.

 

[TheBloods]

I recall him play. Quite different to the other Windies players. As your Dad says, not so flashy, more a grafter of runs. Came in about no 7 perhaps and tended to make a reasonable score.

 

[Dipper]

Well I think he tended to come in a little bit higher than number 7.


I saw him in the 1984 series against England & obviously he was left hander who provided a bit of balance to what was a pretty attacking Windies top order.

When you had Greenidge & Richards especially not to mention Haynes & Lloyd who weren't exactly defensive players it was no bad thing to have Gomes in there.


To be honest though it's a long time ago now & I don't remember him as clearly as I think I should.


But funnily enough I've just looked him up on the net & coincidentially in my reply to you about Greendige on another thread I mention how Windies knocked off 340 odd to win with the loss of one wicket with Greendige scoring a double century well apparently Gomes was 92* in that same innings.

 

[P76]

Well, it seems that Hilary Angelo Gomes may be becoming one of the forgotten men of Windies cricket of the late 70s through 80s, which would be a shame, as he was a vital player in their team.

He was certainly no stroke-maker, more a grafter, although he did occasionally hit a six I remember. Probably the best way I could think to describe him as a player was as a Border in his latter years - totally unflappable, usually very reliable, and a great foil to the Greenidges etc. at the other end - they did the stroke making, and Larry turned over the strike and stayed in.

Averaged a touch under 40, so very handy.

I thought he was a lower order bat 5,6,or7, but looking at his stats, it shows that he was the everywhere man - in 91 innings, his batting positions were as follows -
3 : 29 times
4 : 39 times
5 : 14 times
6 : 6 times
7: 4 times
(which adds up to 92, but I'm not going to do it again!)

Perhaps I thought he was lower because he always seemed to still be there at the end of their innings.

But never mind Dipper, I have a book "The Illustrated history of Australian Cricket by Jack Pollard, and it refers to him more than once as Larry Gomez, so you're doing pretty well to remember his correct name

 

[red+black]

i remember it being a momentous occasion towards the end of his career when he hit a six, can't recall if it was a test, ODI, or 1st class. he was never one to score fast or go the tonk.

he did have an average of 56.10 v Australia, scoring 6 of his 9 centuries against us. interestingly, his average v Pakistan and v New Zealand was in the low 20's. Adelaide was the only ground anywhere that he scored 2 centuries.

(obviously i looked it up)

 

[red+black]

and the man turned 50 three weeks ago. i found some info at http://www.tntsport.org.tt/gomez.html

one site says that he lives in Canada (at least he was in 1999).

just checked his average v Australia in Australia: 70.33

in terms of opposition, he's probably going to be most remembered by us Aussies.

 

[Crooked Rain]

I think it was either the 81/82 or 83/84 one day series in Aus, but young Larry actually won the Kit Kat best Bowling strike rate competition. It was a massive turn up for the books considering the quality of the other bowlers in the 'Benson and Hedges World Series Cup' that year and back then spinners were seen as useless in the one day game.

The organisers obviously didn't forsee a major flaw in their work which didn't account for the amount of balls bowled and Larry didn't bowl many, but his numbers were impressive enough to take the cake.

It was Aus/WI/PAK from memory in that series - it was the series I first got into cricket.

Loved those posters of all the teams from Maccas for 10 cents. Still got a couple of 'em.

cr

 

[jim boy]

He was one of my favourite players when I was young, probably because of the unassuming way that we went about accumulating runs. However my most graphic memory of him is his spitting out of his front teeth in a ODI against Sri Lanka at the G. DS De Silva was the bowler I think.

 

[Crooked Rain]

I thought it was Rumesh Ratnayake? Great slinger action and very quick.

cr

 

[bunsen burner]

Gomes had the Lionel Ritchie look down to a tee. Everytime I see old footage I can't but help break into an emotional version of Hello.

 

[dr nick]

****ing hell bunsen. thanks to you i had that damn song in my head all afternoon

 

[royal]

Pushing the memory, but the hairdo was afro-esque.