The Recreation Ground is the premier cricket venue in the cricket-mad Caribbean isle of Antigua. It took the local cricket authorities a while to persuade the West Indies Cricket Board to award 'Test' status to the venue. The ground hosted its first one-day international in 1977-78, and its first Test three years later.

A unique feature of the Recreation Ground for several years was the involvement of inmates of the adjacent prison in its maintenance. They were roped in to assist the groundstaff with the blessings of the prison authorities. One of them was Malcolm Richards, a long-time warden of the prison, who is better known today as the father of Antigua's foremost jewel; Sir Isaac Vivian Alexander Richards.

The advent of Richards, arguably the greatest batsman ever to represent the West Indies, was a tremendous shot in the arm for the cricket-crazy residents of Antigua. One of his teammates in Clive Lloyd's invincible team of the late 1970s and early 1980s was fellow Antiguan Andy Roberts, who constituted one-fourth of the most lethal pace quartet in the history of the game.

The Antiguan spectators' joy knew no bounds when Richards celebrated the Recreation Ground's Test baptism in 1980-81 with a hundred. That their favourite son had got married a few days before the Test match only added to the jubilation of the crowds. England, who were at the receiving end of that knock, expected an encore when they returned to the island on their next tour five years later. It was just that Richards was a determined man, and difficult to dislodge once he made up his mind to achieve a particular goal. What England did not expect however, was a massacre.

Richards mutilated the bowling to slam a hundred off only 56 balls, and prompted all-rounder Ian Botham to state later that 'bowling to him was like bowling to God'. The Antiguans could not have asked for more, with seven boundaries and seven sixes flying off Richards' flashing blade. His blitzkrieg put the West Indies on the road to victory in what was the fifth and final Test of the 1985-86 series. The Windies won the game and thus completed their second successive 5-0 'blackwash' of England. .

A key member of Viv Richards's West Indies team in 1985-86 was the aggressive Richie Richardson, who like his fellow Antiguans idolized Viv Richards. Richardson eventually succeeded Richards to the captaincy of the West Indies in 1991. He also emulated his childhood hero by not wearing a helmet for most of his career. Richards stuck to his resolve till the very end, but Richardson broke his towards the end of his career.

That blistering hundred by Richards against England in 1985-86, his third at his home ground, set the tone for future matches at the Recreation Ground. To describe the venue as a batsman's paradise is nothing short of an understatement. The man who succeeded Richards and Richardson as the undisputed batting hero of the Caribbean will vouch for the same.

Brian Charles Lara rewrote the record-books with his innings of 375 against England at the Recreation Ground in 1993-94. He broke the 35 year-old held by fellow West Indian Sir Garfield Sobers for the highest individual Test score (365) in the process, and became an international celebrity overnight. His mark of 375 was subsequently surpassed by Australian opener Matthew Hayden in 2003. Lara then did the unimaginable, exactly a decade after he had established the world record.

He scored 400, the first 'quadruple' in the history of Test cricket in the 2003-04 season. He could not have chosen a better ground or a better opponent to do so. The opponent was England, the same team off whom he had taken 375, and the venue the Recreation Ground, where he had smashed Sobers' record! Never before in Test history had a player re-rewrote the record-books in this fashion!

Not that Lara neglected the Recreation Ground between his two 'magnum-opuses'. Placed, or rather played, between both of them was his swashbuckling 100 against Australia in 1998-99. It was his third consecutive hundred of a four-Test series in which he helped his team rise from a humiliating defeat in the first Test to a 2-1 lead after the third game. His 213 in the second Test and unbeaten 153 in the third were match-winning efforts, but his round ton at Antigua couldn't prevent defeat.

What Lara and his men couldn't do at Antigua in 1998-99, they did in their next home series against the same team in 2002-03. The West Indies had already lost the series by the time the teams arrived in Antigua for the last Test, but Lara was in no mood to let the Aussies return home unbeaten. That Test witnessed some stirring battles, some absorbing duels and regrettably, some atrocious behaviour. It climaxed with the West Indies achieving a target of 418, the highest-ever chased by any team to win a Test match. The Recreation Ground thus had another world record in its kitty.

The dominance of bat over ball has ensured several draws, but not many of them have been boring affairs, thanks to the unique West Indian approach towards the game that is laced with excitement and exuberance. The exception was the Test match against India in 2001-02, in which a phenomenal number of batsmen scored hundreds and quite a few players whose main job was to bat ended up taking wickets. They did so because their respective captains thought it unwise to exhaust their specialist bowlers on an unresponsive strip.

No other ground in the world has witnessed one quadruple Test hundred and as many as two Test triple hundreds. The second was scored by Chris Gayle, who hammered South Africa for 317 in the 2004-05 series.

Like most of its counterparts in the Caribbean, the Recreation Ground is replete with animated spectators and a fair number of musical instruments whenever it hosts an international cricket match. The situation won't be much different on 2nd June 2006, when the first Test of the forthcoming series between the West Indies and India gets underway here.

The Recreation Ground has recently acquired a younger sibling. The ICC has approved the use of the spanking Sir Vivian Richards stadium during the 2007 World Cup.

Ends: Pavilion End and Factory Road End

- By Devendra Prabhudesai