Cricket honoured with Stokes on New Year list

LONDON: Ben Stokes and several of his England Cricket World Cup-winning team-mates were recognised in Britain’s New Year Honours list announced on Friday, as two West Indies greats, Clive Lloyd and Gordon Greenidge, received knighthoods.

All-rounder Stokes was made an OBE (Officer of the Order of the British Empire) after scoring an unbeaten 84 as England’s men won the World Cup for the first time by edging out New Zealand in a dramatic final at Lord’s in July before his brilliant 135 not out secured a stunning one-wicket victory in the third Ashes Test against Australia at Headingley six weeks later.

For Stokes, playing in the ongoing first Test against South Africa at Centurion having recently been voted the BBC’s Sports Personality of the Year, it was all a far cry from the career-threatening situation he faced before he was acquitted on a charge of affray in August 2018 after an early hours incident outside a Bristol nightclub the previous September.

Meanwhile Eoin Morgan, who captained England to World Cup glory, was named a CBE (Commander of the Order of the British Empire), one rank below a knighthood. Wicketkeeper Jos Buttler and England’s top run-scorer in the tournament and Test skipper Joe Root were both awarded MBEs (Members of the Order of the British Empire), the level beneath an OBE.

Australian Trevor Bayliss, England’s World Cup-winning coach, received an OBE while Colin Graves, the England and Wales Cricket Board chairman, was made a CBE. Morgan said: “I’m very proud to have been awarded a CBE. Winning the World Cup has been a dream come true and the honours and awards that have come since that day at Lord’s really mean a lot to everyone connected with the team.”

Lloyd, the forerunner of today’s modern power batsmen and brilliant fielders, hit a superb century as the West Indies beat Australia in the inaugural 1975 World Cup final at Lord’s. As captain, the Guyanese also played a key role in transforming the West Indies into the dominant side in Test cricket during the 1970s and 1980s.

Lloyd starred for Lancashire as well and the 75-yearold remained based in Manchester, home to the county’s Old Trafford ground, long after he became a cricket official when his playing days had ended.

His knighthood means Lloyd will be officially known as ‘Sir Clive’. Opening batsman Greenidge, a key figure in Lloyd’s all-conquering team, has been knighted on the recommendation of the government of his native Barbados, with certain Caribbean nations conferring their own honours. Greenidge spent part of his childhood in England against whom he gave many of his best Test performances, including two hundreds at Old Trafford in 1976 and a match-winning unbeaten double century at Lord’s in 1984.

He was also a Hampshire stalwart and helped the southern side win English cricket’s first-class County Championship in 1973. Lloyd and Greenidge often found themselves playing against England’s Alan Knott, one of the best wicketkeepers cricket has known, who received a MBE some four decades after he played the last of his 95 Tests.

Women’s sport was well represented in the latest honours list, which seeks to acknowledge outstanding individuals in a wide range of fields from Britain and its former colonies that now form part of the Commonwealth. Catriona Matthew the captain of the victorious European women’s Solheim Cup golf team and two-time Olympic taekwondo champion Jade Jones each received the OBE. So too did jump horseracing trainers Paul Nicholls and Nicky Henderson. Nicholls has won 11 British jumps titles, with Henderson the champion trainer on five occasions. — AFP