Back in the mid-1960s, West Indian cricket followers often spoke of the regional side’s glorious batting by pairing together outstanding names.

So, it was ‘Sobers and Kanhai, Nurse and Butcher’, which shouldn’t be read as being disrespectful to the great opener, the late Sir Conrad Hunte. It’s just that in a Test career spanning 1958-67, Sir Conrad was without a consistent opening partner.

In the case of Sir Garfield Sobers, and Messrs Rohan Kanhai, Seymour Nurse and Basil Butcher, the first two were widely considered batting geniuses. Yet, despite being paired in folklore, they sparkled as a batting partnership only rarely.

Often, Messrs Kanhai and Sobers, walking to the crease at numbers three and six in the batting order, would find Messrs Nurse and Butcher — at four and five — as their most reliable partners.

As it has turned out, Messrs Nurse and Butcher, two of the more dependable and consistent middle order batsmen ever to have represented West Indies, departed this world within months of each other.

Mr Nurse died in his native Barbados in May at age 85. Mr Butcher drew his last breath on December 16, aged 86 in the USA.

Both were right-hand batsmen. Stylistically, that’s about where the resemblance ended. Guided by some of the great Barbadian cricketers of the day, including the legendary Sir Everton Weekes, Mr Nurse was an orthodox stroke player, pleasing to the eye, and equally capable either side of the wicket.

Mr Butcher, from Berbice in Guyana, got little or no coaching, which may have been the reason he tended to be bottom-handed, very inclined to play to leg, sometimes running into trouble by playing across the line. But such was his hand-eye coordination that bowlers targeted his stumps at their peril, as his wristy flicks found the square leg and mid-wicket boundary with regularity.

Both Messrs Nurse and Butcher struggled to assert themselves in the West Indies team because of the high level of competition for batting places in the late 1950s and early 1960s.

Competition, as well as injuries, limited Mr Nurse to just 29 Tests, scoring 2,523 runs for an average of 47.60 with six centuries. Incredibly, he retired at age 35 after his most successful series ever, scoring over 500 runs — including a double century — in five innings on tour of New Zealand in 1969.

Older Jamaicans still marvel at Mr Nurse’s stroke-filled, counter-attacking 73 against England on a badly cracked Sabina pitch in ’68. One glorious cover drive lives in the memory of those who saw it. Mr Nurse, fully stretched, left foot to the pitch of the ball, right knee touching the ground; then leaving the field to change because he had split the seat of his trousers.

Mr Butcher, in 44 Tests, scored 3,104 runs at an average of 43.11 with seven centuries. Perhaps his finest Test innings came against England at Trent Bridge, Nottingham in 1966. With West Indies trailing by 90 runs on first innings, Messrs Butcher and Kanhai battened down and put away extravagant shots to frustrate England on the third afternoon.

They were booed by the crowd and the English press lashed out at the “death of calypso cricket”.

But on the fourth day, Mr Butcher returned to score an unbeaten 209 — the pivotal innings as West Indies eventually won the Test match.

Caribbean people today yearn for more of that steely determination.