BRIDGETOWN, Barbados (CMC) — Wes Hall, the legendary West Indies fast bowler of the 1960s who helped to birth successive generations of great Caribbean pace men, has been knighted in the Queen’s Birthday Honours list.

The government announced here yesterday that the 74-yearold — who went on to head the West Indies Cricket Board (WICB) and also become a colourful speaker and figure in public service in government, business and religion — would be made a Knight Bachelor (KB) for his “contribution to sport and the community”.

Hall, a charismatic figure on and off the field, took 192 wickets in 48 Tests during an 11-year Test cricket career that has earned him a place in the West Indies Cricket Hall of Fame as the first West Indian to take a hat-trick in a Test match (dismissing three batsmen in successive balls), a feat he achieved against India in his first match in 1958.

He went on to take 30 wickets in the five-match series and become a permanent fixture in the starstudded West Indies side that included the incomparable Garry Sobers, Conrad Hunte and Rohan Kanhai.

Sobers and Hunte also went on to receive Knighthoods.

Hall was one of the heroes of the historic first tied Test against Australia at Brisbane in 1960, claiming match figures of nine for 203 and bowling the dramatic final over as West Indies claimed three wickets to earn the first tie in 84 years of Test cricket.

A tall, muscular bowler, Hall and fellow Barbadian Charlie Griffith became one of the most fearsome duos in cricket, strike bowlers who presaged the quartet of West Indian pacers that would come to dominate the game decades later.

But in what was later described as his “finest hour”, Sir Wesley bowled without a break for more than three hours against England in the summer of 1963, on the final day of the second Test at Lord’s to draw the match.

He grabbed 16 wickets in the series and in tandem with Griffith who grabbed 32, propelled West Indies to a 3-1 victory in the five-match series.