Je­lani Beck­les

West In­dies icon Bri­an Lara yes­ter­day paid trib­ute to for­mer T&T and West In­dies off spin­ner Rangy Nanan as a man who was to­tal­ly de­vot­ed to crick­et and one whose pas­sion and ded­i­ca­tion to the game was un­par­al­leled.

Nanan, 62, died yes­ter­day morn­ing of a heart at­tack at the Cou­va Hos­pi­tal.

Ex­tend­ing con­do­lences to Nanan's fam­i­ly, Lara said he will al­ways have fond mem­o­ries, not on­ly for Nanan's love, pas­sion and ded­i­ca­tion as a play­er and ad­min­is­tra­tor, but for the in­te­gral role he played in his own ca­reer. "We spent many en­joy­able mo­ments in the dress­ing room. My great­est mem­o­ries will have to be the count­less bat­tles we had in the nets against each oth­er. It al­ways felt like I was in school when fac­ing his prodi­gious­ly turn­ing off breaks. I learnt a lot about the art of play­ing spin from Rangy. I think he en­joyed bowl­ing to me and I def­i­nite­ly en­joyed bat­ting against and learn­ing from him."

Lara not­ed that up to re­cent­ly Nanan was a reg­u­lar face at match­es in the Oval. "He shared his vi­sion freely to all the crick­eters with whom he came in­to con­tact. We are all bet­ter play­ers and in­di­vid­u­als be­cause of him, and the wis­dom he so freely and read­i­ly im­part­ed. We will miss him. I will miss him."

Az­im Bas­sarath, pres­i­dent of the T&T Crick­et Board said Nanan will be best re­mem­bered for be­ing the last T&T cap­tain to lead the na­tion­al crick­et team to vic­to­ry in the West In­dies Crick­et Board Re­gion­al Four-Day Tour­na­ment, then called the Shell Shield.

"Rangy was one of a kind who will be re­mem­bered for his tight con­trol with the ball on any kind of sur­face, and who was no rab­bit with the bat, clout­ing the ball to all parts of the field," said Bas­sarath.

For­mer West In­dies man­ag­er Omar Khan said Nanan al­ways gave his all on the field. "Rangy was a con­sum­mate pro­fes­sion­al. He was well or­gan­ised and al­ways want­ed to be the per­fect per­son in terms of crick­et, he nev­er want­ed to bowl a bad ball."

Khan added, "As an ad­min­is­tra­tor he was a great ser­vant to T&T and West In­dies crick­et. He was very jovial and en­joyed life and liked to be around peo­ple. He loved to im­part his knowl­edge to the young­sters."

Alec Burns, who was his team­mate said Nanan had a big heart and noth­ing was im­pos­si­ble for him. "He had a nev­er say die at­ti­tude."

Nanan suf­fered a stroke four years ago and had lim­it­ed mo­bil­i­ty since then. He is sur­vived by his wife Martha and two sons.

At the time of his re­tire­ment in 1991, Nanan was the lead­ing wick­et-tak­er in re­gion­al com­pe­ti­tion. In his 19-year play­ing ca­reer, he played 94 First Class match­es, scor­ing 2,607 runs at an av­er­age of 20.85 and took 366 wick­ets, in ad­di­tion to 35 List "A" fix­tures.

His best bowl­ing came in the 1981-1982 re­gion­al sea­son when he took 32 wick­ets in just five match­es in the Shell Shield and re­tired as the lead­ing wick­et-tak­er in 1991.

Nanan played one Test for the West In­dies against Pak­istan in Faisal­abad in 1980 when he took four wick­ets and snared two im­por­tant catch­es as the Caribbean crick­eters won by 156 runs.