A huge loss

LEGENDARY commentator, writer and television analyst Tony Cozier was yesterday hailed as the doyen of West Indies cricket by one the Caribbean’s best ever fast bowlers, Michael Holding, who rated him alongside Sir Garfield Sobers.

Noting Cozier, 75, who died yesterday at the Bayview Hospital after a well-chronicled battle with cancer, was “a huge loss” to West Indies cricket, Holding said he was someone who loved the game, worshipped West Indies cricket and wasn’t afraid to speak his mind.

“He was always someone who spoke, in his mind, what the truth was and assessed the game and assessed conditions and everything surrounding the game and wrote and spoke about it fearlessly,” Holding said.

“As far as the Caribbean is concerned, he’s right up there with Garry Sobers. I think people will call Garry Sobers the best cricketer ever, around the entire world. I wouldn’t say Tony Cozier is the greatest writer and commentator across the world because I’ve heard so much about people like John Arlott.

“But from what I know having played cricket and during my association with cricket, I’ve known no one here better in the Caribbean. A huge loss. When you look at West Indies cricket and the respected voices, and people who write about West Indies cricket over the last 60 years, it’s Tony Cozier first by some distance in my opinion and then Tony Becca,” declared Holding. (JM/EZS)

Please read the full story in today’s Daily Nation, or in the eNATION edition.