by Mayukh Ghosh

In 1966, there were repeatedly letters to the BBC complaining about the employment of a 'black bastard'.
That 'black bastard' was accustomed to seeing jaws dropping when people met him for the first time and discovered that he was not black.

The 25 year old was the visiting commentator on Test Match Special.
This was his second trip to England.
In 1963, he covered the Test series as a freelancer, often sleeping in YMCAs and friends' sofas.

For the next 50 years, he was pretty much the voice of West Indian cricket.

He possessed a wonderful zest for life. He loved to party and threw bashes close to his beach hut on the east coast of Barbados.
Everybody was invited and most journalists found a way to reach there in most years.

Vic Marks met him in Cardiff in 2013 and describes how he was so full of life even at that age.
" Towards the end of a meal in the basement of an Italian restaurant there came the strains of Elvis Presley. Tony's antennae were alerted: he started to sing. The diners at the next table were South Africans following the cricket- and, it turned out, just as keen on Elvis. And there was Tony, delicately dancing around the tables with one of the wives, a smile on his face, and a sparkle in his eye."

In an age when commentators compare W.G. Grace's batting with Sunil Narine's , Tony Cozier is sorely missed.

Tony Cozier was born on July 10, 1940.