FREDERICKS, Roy Clifton

D.O.B: November 11, 1942 (Blairmont, Berbice)

Teams: Berbice, Guyana, Glamorgan, West Indies

Roy Clifton Fredericks was a diminutive, attacking, left-handed opening batsman who played 59 Test matches and 12 One-Day Internationals for the West Indies between 1968 and 1977.
For most of his career he was the region’s premier opener, changing partners on no less than 15 occasions. It was not until Gordon Greenidge partnered him towards the end of his international tenure that Fredericks found a reliable ally and the West Indies, a sound opening pair.
Freddo (as he was popularly called), made the Demerara Cricket Club his home early in his career and made his first class debut for British Guiana in 1964 in the inter-colonial tournament. He did little of note until 1967 when he punished a strong Barbados bowling line up at Bourda to register twin hundreds-127 and 115.
His effort was good enough to earn him a place in the squad to Australia and New Zealand in 1968-69 and he duly made his debut in the second Test of the series at Melbourne where he compiled a top-score of 76 in the first innings and an accomplished 47 in the second.
He found the going tough in the final three Tests of the series and on the tour of New Zealand but like a true warrior bounced back to crack three half centuries in the short visit to England in 1969, including two in the Lord’s Test.
The famous Indian spinners Srinivas Venkataraghavan, Bishen Singh Bedi and Erapalli Prasana made life extremely difficult for him in the Caribbean in 1971 and he suffered the indignity of being dismissed with the first ball of a Test match at the Queen’s Park Oval.
However, in the second innings of the same match he was run out for 80-his then highest Test score-albeit in a losing cause.
Fredericks used his international experience to score heavily in the regional Shell Shield Tournament and in 1972 scored a solid and entertaining maiden Test hundred (163) at Sabina Park against New Zealand. His knock was only overshadowed by the brilliance of the debutant Lawerence George Rowe but it was a turning point in his career.
To further enhance his all round play, he turned out for Glamorgan between 1971-1973 and although he was growing in confidence and maturity, there were some who doubted his ability to conquer spin or to occupy the crease for long intervals. It is interesting to note that four of his eight Test hundreds were scored in just those conditions.
In 1973 at Edgbaston he made 150 stretched over eight and a half hours to ensure a draw; in 1974-75 in India against Chandersekar, Bedi and Prasana he made 100 at Calcutta and 104 in Bombay; in 1977 at the Queen’s Park Oval in Trinidad he carefully crafted 120 against Pakistan’s Intikhab Alam, Mustaq Mohammed and Iqbal Qasim.
His most memorable Test innings was undoubtedly against Australia on a Perth flier in 1975-76 when he opened the batting with Bernard Julien and battered Denis Lilee, Jeff Thompson, Max Walker and Gary Gilmour into submission.
Batting as a man possessed, he charged to his century off only 71 deliveries and when his innings ended at 169 he had struck 27 blistering fours and a six. His innings left the Aussies in a state of shock and was largely responsible for a comprehensive series-levelling innings and 87 runs victory by the West Indies.
At this time of his career, bowlers around the world feared him and the top bowlers of the region felt the full force of his flashing blade. In 1975, at the Kensington Oval against Barbados in a Shell Shield encounter, he eased his way to an imperious 250 against Testites Vanburn Holder, Keith Boyce, Tony Howard and Albert Padmore and it stood as the highest individual score in the competition for 18 years.
He helped the West Indies to win the inaugural World Cup that was staged in England in 1975 with some scintillating batting although in the final at Lord’s he hooked Australia’s Lilee out of the ground only to tread on his wicket for a duck.
Yet the cut and the hook were his trademark shots for which he won huge acclaim. Former England seamer and now expert cricket writer Mike Selvey asserts, “There has probably never been a better or more willing exponent of the hook”.
In Fredericks’ day One Day International cricket was in its embryonic stage but he scored his runs at a quick clip and has the distinction of registering the first ODI hundred by a West Indian player in only his second game. It stood for sometime as the highest individual ODI score by anyone.
After a stint with Australian Kerry Packer’s World Series cricket, Fredericks retired rather prematurely and took up a position of Minister of Sport in the Forbes Burnham-led government.
He came out of retirement in 1983 and promptly chalked up 103 against Trinidad and Tobago at Albion and 217 against Jamaica at Bourda in the regional first-class competition to bring the curtains down on an illustrious career.
All told he was involved in 223 first-class games and aggregated 16 384 runs at 45.89 and in the process garnered 40 centuries. He also picked up 75 wickets with his left-arm wrist spin and secured 177 catches mainly at gully and forward short-leg.
Roy Fredericks died in New York on September 05, 2000.

RECORD
TESTS: 59 RUNS: 4 334 AVG: 42.49
HS: 169 vs Australia, Perth 1975-76          CENTURIES: 8                          WICKETS: 7
(Digicel: Guyana’s Bigger, Better Network)