Mumbai : For Farokh Engineer, Sir Garfield Sobers was more than cricket’s greatest allrounder. He was a teammate, an opponent, a golfing partner and one of his closest friends. As the cricket world mourned the death of the West Indies legend at the age of 89 on Friday, the former India wicketkeeper remembered Sobers as a once-ina-lifetime cricketer whose genius remains unmatched.“I’m one of the few Indian cricketers who played against and with Sobers,” Engineer told TOI from Manchester. “No Indian player knew him better than I did. What a phenomenal man he was!” Engineer believes the debate over cricket’s greatest allrounder ends with Sobers. “We’ve had great batters like Sunil Gavaskar, Sachin Tendulkar and Dilip Vengsarkar, but Sobers was the most complete cricketer I’ve ever played with or against. He could bat, bowl left-arm pace, chinaman and orthodox spin, and field in the slips better than anyone.”Former India captain Chandu Borde, who faced Sobers through the 1950s and 1960s, echoed that sentiment. “I’m yet to come across a better allrounder than Sobers. He was the Kohinoor of cricket,” Borde said. “There used to be a celebration in our dressing room every time we dismissed him.”
