Anticipating and looking eagerly ahead to today's historic occasion at Castle Avenue, I can justly claim that it was a West Indian, and a rather famous one at that, who started me playing cricket. Growing up in Limerick, we lived beside the Catholic Institute club and there, as kids, we used to sit on the boundary. One day shortly after the second World War, I saw my first black, who just happened to be Leary Constantine, the great West Indian Test player who was later knighted for his services to the game.

From his position in the outfield, he talked to us as we gaped at his coloured skin and gold teeth. When asked, we replied that no, we hadn't ever played cricket, and the great man advised us that we should at least give it a go. We did, and soon we were playing with a schoolboy side, and then with a club. We were hooked for life.

In those pre-TV days, we gathered round our radios to listen to John Arlott drawing word pictures of events at Old Trafford or the Oval, and after all these years I can still remember the joy we felt in 1950 when the West Indies trounced England. We sang with gusto the calypso which summed up the series:

Yardley tried his best

But Goddard won the Test.

They gave the crowd plenty fun;

Second Test and West Indies won.

With those little pals of mine

Ramadhin and Valentine.

It is strangely fitting that the West Indies are visiting Ireland this year, albeit briefly. Next July 2nd will mark the 30th anniversary of that incredible match at Sion Mills, when Dougie Goodwin's Ireland side defeated the tourists by nine wickets. Here's what Wisden said about it:

"In some ways this one-day match provided the sensation of the season. The West Indies, with six of the team who had escaped on the previous day from defeat in the Lord's Test, were skittled for 25 in this tiny Ulster town on a damp and definitely emerald green pitch. The conditions were all in favour of the bowlers, but the West Indies batsmen fell in the main to careless strokes and smart catching. Goodwin, the Irish captain, took five wickets for six runs and O'Riordan four for 18. Both bowled medium pace at a reasonable length and the pitch did the rest. It was not a first class match, but Ireland's performance deserves a permanent record . . . "

The West Indies have been back in Ireland many times since then, of course, with teams that have included many of their greatest players. They have played with that extraordinary cricketing joie de vivre which is their hallmark, they have hugely entertained the crowds and - very likely - enticed many other kids to take up cricket. Many of cricket's brightest stars, such as Viv Richards, Desmond Haynes, Joel Gardner and Gordon Greenidge (now the Bangladesh national coach), have brought another dimension to our sporting lives down the years. Their captain now, the great Brian Lara, is no stranger to Castle Avenue. On his first visit, in 1995, he was caught and bowled by Neil Doak for nine, to the obvious chagrin of the spectators, who had come (as the saying goes) to watch Lara batting, rather than see the Irish bowling. Let's hope that today will be different . . .

West Indies cricket is said to be on the decline, or at the very least going through a poor patch. But it's hard to ignore, or writeoff, a team which includes Lara, Curtly Ambrose, Shivnarine Chanderpaul, Phil Simmons, and Courtney Walsh, not forgetting the wicket-keeper/batsman Ridley Jacobs, who played for Eglinton last year.

But it takes two to tango, and also to play cricket, so let's welcome back Bangladesh, who toured Ireland in our last ghastly so-called summer. Many of that squad, including the captain Aminul Islam, and allrounder Mohammed Rafique, are back again; three of the matches up in the north west were washed out, but it's worth noting that Ireland's amateurs defeated the touring side by four wickets at Waringstown.

So the stage is set for the sort of event experienced only "on state occasions and bonfire nights", as a previous generation of Irish people used to say so colourfully. No matter what the outcome, today's confrontation at Castle Avenue is historic, truly one for the record books, and our sporting life and tradition will clearly be the richer for it.

Squads

WEST INDIES: Brian Lara (capt), Jimmy Adams, Curtly Ambrose, Keith Arthurton, Henderson Bryan, Sherwin Campbell, Shivnarine Chanderpaul, Mervyn Dillon, Ridley Jacobs, Reon King, Nehemiah Perry, Ricardo Powell, Phil Simmons, Courtney Walsh, Stuart Williams.

BANGLADESH: Aminul Islam (capt), Shahriar Hossain, Khaled Mashud, Faruk Ahmed, Mehrab Hossain, Akram Khan, Shafiuddin Ahmed, Khaled Mahmud, Naimur Rahman, Hasibul Hussain, Mahammed Rafique, Enamul Hoque, Monjural Islam, Neeyamur Rashid, Minhajul Abedin.

The life story of West Indian bowler Courtney Walsh - Heart of the Lion - makes for essential reading for anyone interested in the sport and is published by Lancaster Publishing at Stg£18.99.