Steve Bucknor 128 retired
When one thinks of retired great West Indians who have a least one hundred tests behind them, names like Vivian Richards, Gordon Greenidge, Clive Lloyd, Brian Lara and Courtney Walsh easily come to mind.
Well now there is one more great to add to that illustrious list, he is not a cricketer but an umpire, Steve Bucknor.
Bucknor’s international umpiring career came to an end in the Fourth One Day International ( ODI) between West Indies and England at the Kensington Oval , Barbados on Sunday. His last Test match was between South Africa and Australia at Cape Town, South Africa a week ago. In all he officiated in 128 Test matches and 181 ODIs.
He leaves as the world record holder for most test matches officiated in and second in the all-time list in ODIs behind South African umpire Rudy Koertzen.
Born Stephen Anthony Bucknor on May 31, 1946 in Montego Bay, Jamaica, he started his international umpiring in an ODI between West Indies and India at St John’s, Antigua on March 18 1989.
His first Test match was also in that series in his native Jamaica which was held from April 28 to May 3. In all, he donned the white coat and black trousers for 20 years at the highest level, which is an accomplishment by itself.
His own personal style was apparent, he was always seen with sun block plastered over his face and in the way he signalled to a batsman that he was out. He was very methodical and would wait a few seconds before sticking out his tongue and saying “out” before he raising the dreaded finger.
One of the many highlights of his career is that Bucknor officiated in five World Cups starting in 1992 and he went on to umpire the final matches of each tournament. The only downside to that amazing accomplishment is that he was allowed to do so because West Indies were never able to make it to the final of the tournament.
He always said he would gladly give up the record to have his beloved West Indies side win another World Cup having won it 1975 and 1979.
The record is one that may stand for a very long time or it may not ever be broken seeing that there are now so many umpires on the International Cricket Council’s ( ICC) elite panel and that an umpire can only officiate in the final if his native country in not in the final.
Bucknor was a high school mathematics teacher, sports coach and he later went on to become a FIFA approved football referee. He actually officiated in a football World Cup qualifying match between the Netherlands Antilles and El Salvador in 1988. He was forced to give this up and the rest they say is history.
He later became a member of the ICC elite umpire panel and stayed on the panel until his retirement He was nominated in 2007 for umpire of the year but that honour went to Simon Taufel of Australia
As with any sporting legend there will always have some controversy , and Steve Bucknor was no different. In a sport with so many technological advances the umpires job came under sever scrutiny. As with all umpires, not all of their decisions would be correct, and Bucknor was no different. He had to face the ire of the cricketing world most notably the cricket worshipping nation of India.
Bucknor was criticised during India’s tour to Australia in 2007-08, when in the Test match in Sydney he gave Andrew Symonds not out twice in the Australian first innings and Rahul Dravid out when replays suggested otherwise. This led to Bucknor being unceremoniously replaced for the next Test match by Billy Bowden after the Indian Cricket Board complained to the ICC.
Bucknor was also an umpire in the 2007 World Cup final between Sri Lanka and Australia that ended in total darkness with the umpires being blamed for misinterpreting the rules related to bad light. This led him to being suspended from the 20/20 World Championships in South African. In the end Bucknor never officiated in the newest form of the game the twenty-twenty matches.
In his last Test match he given a guard of honour and was seen praying as he usually did every morning. In his last ODI he was honoured before the start of the match and he said farewell to the sport he gave a lot of his life to by making a lap of honour around the Kensington Oval.
In the end Bucknor will be remembered as one of the game’s greats and one of the most respected umpires in the history of the cricket.