GoFundMe page to help ex-WI bowler Patrick Patterson

A GoFundMe page has been set up to provide financial assistance for former West Indies fast bowler Patrick Patterson.

Bharat Sundaresan, who travelled to Jamaica to interview Patterson for The Indian Express in 2017, is arranging the initiative. He wrote that in 2017, "after three visits to the Caribbean looking for him, I found Mr Patterson in his home country of Jamaica. He didn't recall much of his past life or his glory days as a cricketer and was just about managing to scrape through every day."

The goal is to raise US$20,000 for Patterson.

On the GoFundMe page, Sundaresan said, “Mr Patterson is currently struggling to even purchase groceries and to make sure he gets two meals a day...this is a plea not only to the cricketing community but to everyone who he entertained with his breath-taking displays of raw pace and that inimitable bowling action which has been attempted in every gully and backyard around the world.”

At 1 pm on Thursday TT time, US$4,780 had already been raised.

Patterson, 59, played 28 Test matches and 59 One Day Internationals for West Indies from 1986-1993.

The Jamaican grabbed 90 wickets in ODI cricket and 93 wickets in Test cricket. His best bowling figures in Test cricket were 5/24 and in ODI cricket his most memorable effort was 6/29.

Patterson played in an era when West Indies fast bowlers tormented opposing batsmen as that time also included Joel Garner, Michael Holding, Courtney Walsh, Malcolm Marshall, Ian Bishop and Sir Curtly Ambrose.

Former wicketkeeper Jeffrey Dujon, who played for West Indies from 1981-1991, said Patterson was the fastest bowler from the region during that time.

People willing to help can visit: GoFundMe

https://www.gofundme.com/f/help-patrick-patterson-get-on-his-feet-again?utm_source=customer&utm_medium=copy_link&utm_campaign=p_cf+share-flow-1