Former Everest, Demerara, Guyana and President’s Eleven Off-spinner Adjodha Persaud passed away recently in the USA at the age of 75.
Persaud took 60 wickets in 28 First-Class matches between 1971 and 1978.
Persaud, played when West Indies’ best off-spinner, Lance Gibbs, was spinning webs around international batters, but was still good enough to represent Guyana against England in 1974, Pakistan in 1977 and Australia in 1978 at the First-Class level.

Persaud was born on August 7, 1949, in Cumberland, Berbice, but later moved to La Jalousie on the West Coast of Demerara.
He was employed in the lumber sales department of Toolsie Persaud Ltd. where he worked until migrating to the USA in 1979.
Persaud played for Everest in the Case Cup (first division) and Rothmans Knockout Cup, winning both competitions. He played under the captaincy of David Persaud and Lal Munilal before ascending to the captaincy of the Camp Road Club.

Persaud was widely regarded as a top-class off-spinner and probably the best of his era, apart from Gibbs, whose long and enduring presence in the West Indies team prevented Persaud from possibly representing the West Indies.
In his younger days he represented the West Coast Demerara under-16 side and was known as ‘Boy Wonder’. He excelled in his various encounters with opposition throughout the country and decided to join the Everest Cricket Club to try and climb the steep ladder to get onto the national team, which he managed to do.

He played first-class cricket for Demerara, Guyana, and the West Indies President’s eleven (1977 and 1978) as well as representing Warwickshire’s second eleven in the UK circa 1972.
On one memorable occasion in the 1976 Jones Cup Inter-County finals, Adjodha, along with Keith Glasgow set a West Indies first-class batting record for the eighth wicket. The Inter-County final was afforded First-Class status until 1990.

Before migrating, Adjodha was offered a contract to play in the Yorkshire Cricket League in England. However, he decided to go to the USA with his family.
Lloyd Harper, Ovid Glasgow and Mark Harper are some of the players still in Guyana who played with the talented off-spinner before he migrated.