Celebrity chef Ainsley Harriott reveals how his Caribbean family roots developed his love of cricket.
Cooking on gas
Celebrity chef Ainsley Harriott reveals how his family roots developed his love of cricket.
Despite being born in London, it is his Caribbean roots that have influenced his choice of team and with a childhood like his it is unsurprising that he cheers on the West Indies.
"Anybody who came over from the Caribbean in those days you wanted to be associated with something to be reminded of your roots," said Ainsley on Cricket AM.
"Cricket was the obvious thing because we were quite successful at it. In those days not only did we have a nice house because my Dad was in show business but the likes Gary Sobers used to come to our house.
"I remember I would be in our garden under the apple tree with my cricket bat and he would be tossing balls at you. At the time you thought nothing of it because you were a young kid."
Other guests to the Harriott household included Lance Gibbs and Seymour Nurse; and with being related to wicketkeeping legend Jeffrey Dujon, Ainsley must have been quite a good cricketer himself.
"No, I was rubbish. I was not bad at bowling - I was a medium quickie bowler but as far as batting was concerned I was like the west indies number eight and I wanted to put everything to the boundaries."
The state of cricket in the Caribbean is a bit of a worry for Ainsley but he was over there for England's recent tour and believes they are on the way up again.
"I was out in the Caribbean for the last tour that England went on. England went there full of confidence thinking they would prepare themselves for the Ashes coming up. And they were a little bit found out because the Windies have got this new resurgence about them.
"A lot of people say it is Chris Gayle's captaincy as he has this really laid back style."
Obviously this begs the question as to what happened to this new resurgence when the West Indies came over to England, and Ainsley cheekily relies on that old chestnut the English weather.
"Well let's be honest when they came over here it was bitterly cold," laughed Ainsley.
"They turned up and the likes of Sarwan and Chanderpaul did not shine - maybe we will get more of a reaction out of the Twenty20 World Cup.
"I am very concerned but when you have got so many islands competing, the politics in cricket out there is just unbelievable. It does not matter who is trying to control it there are always people knocking other people down.
We as West Indian cricket supporters are all very very concerned and frustrated too.
"But you can never right of the West Indies - you can never right off Holland, Wahey!"
