Ashley Gray

For years I have demanding a book about the West Indies Rebel side to South Africa in the 1980s and finally it has arrived. Covering the lead up to the tour, the tour itself and the repercussions, in chapters covering each player. It is sobering to see the very different routes that players have taken since the tour; Richard Austin drug abuse and death, David Murray drugs and alcohol, Herbert Chang mental illness, to those successful businessmen like Lawrence Rowe, Faoud Bacchus and Franklyn Stephenson.

Much is made by the Rebels of their opposition to apartheid and how they toured to fight apartheid rather than the money. I’m not sure their arguments hold water but then that is between them and their conscience.… (més)