Every single franchise out there — from Northern SuperChargers to Outer Mongolia Nobodies — wants West Indian cricketers, but only for short-form, white-ball cricket. The territories are as fertile as ever in producing physical specimens who can bowl quick and hit long balls. Nobody is rallying round youngsters who want to further the legacy left by previous generations which is, to spell it out, one of the finest, most handsome and most thrilling forms of human self-expression.

Sir Garfield, at the start of his 88th birthday, had to wake up in Barbados to the news that West Indies had lost by 10 wickets. The tourists averaged 22 runs per wicket in the series. In that Edgbaston Test of 1957 Sobers had scored a 50, and a few months later  would score 365* against Pakistan. Clyde Walcott scored 90, Rohan Kanhai 42, Frank Worrell 81 and the brilliant Jamaican Collie Smith, killed aged 26 in a car crash, 161. It was no Mickey Mouse attack: England fielded arguably their finest opening pair of Fred Trueman and Brian Statham, and their finest pair of spinners, Jim Laker and Tony Lock.

If Sir Garfield were starting his career today — he made his Test debut aged 17 — he might never see a red ball. All the money in the Caribbean lies in the white-ball game. He would now be playing for Dambulla Giants and Delhi Capitals, Melbourne Renegades and Multan Sultans, somebody’s Braves and anybody’s Warriors.

West Indian Test cricket on the brink

Real rallying round is required — direct intervention and financial investment — if West Indian Test cricket is to survive. These tourists were set up to flop. Their specialist batsmen needed either an A tour of England last year, or an extended warm-up programme this summer, to re-adjust their basics: from the game and talented opener Mikyle Louis, who cannot plant his front foot in the correct place, through left-handers like Kirk McKenzie as substantial as gossamer, to the keeper Joshua Da Silva playing round his front pad, negating his spirit and toughness: all their batsmen could have done with weeks of cricket in England before the first Test.

And what were they given for preparation? A week of training at Tonbridge School and a three-day game against teenagers at Beckenham.

Even if nobody in cricket feels philanthropic or wants to see the great West Indian traditions preserved, surely the administrators should have helped out just a little? The Lord’s Test ended inside the first hour on day three, so that day’s tickets had to be refunded, and days four and five. That must have been the best part of £10 million: a couple of four-day matches against county players not required in the championship could have been staged for five or six figures.

West Indies in this series effectively had no middle order, just papier mache, apart from Kavem Hodge, who is no youngster at all aged 31. Yet they have a fine number four, who is the only batsman ever to score a century in each innings of a Headingley Test, Shai Hope. Hope was enticed into white-ball cricket, ending up in the IPL and the T20 World Cup. Given a central contract on the line of Joe Root’s, or Steve Smith’s, Hope could have been playing red-ball first-class cricket ahead of this tour and at least partially filling the vacuum.

Mark Wood’s pace dazzled like the sun on the last afternoon at Edgbaston. Suppose he had broken down a month ago when facing Trinidad or Guyana, how gratified would England supporters be? But this is what happened to the West Indies attack-leader, Kemar Roach, in reverse. He broke down after playing for Surrey in the championship in May – leaving Shamar Joseph, who was not match-fit, to play three successive Tests.

It was no surprise the West Indian Test players looked grim at the anthems shortly before 11am on Friday morning. They must have known better than anyone that nobody out there was going to rally round them.