For­mer West In­dies cap­tain Bri­an Lara has called on crick­et au­thor­i­ties to es­tab­lish a Sir Garfield Sobers Ini­tia­tive to in­spire a re­vival of re­gion­al crick­et, de­scrib­ing it as the most fit­ting trib­ute to the man wide­ly re­gard­ed as the great­est all-rounder the game has ever pro­duced.

De­liv­er­ing one of the most emo­tion­al trib­utes at Sir Garfield Sobers' fu­ner­al in Bar­ba­dos to­day, Lara urged "the pow­ers that be" to seize the mo­ment and cre­ate a pro­gramme in Sobers' ho­n­our so that, when the re­gion cel­e­brates what would have been his 100th birth­day in a decade, it could al­so cel­e­brate a resur­gence of West In­dies crick­et.

"If it's some­thing that I'd like to leave here to­day... use this op­por­tu­ni­ty to cre­ate a Sir Garfield Sobers Ini­tia­tive," Lara said. "An ini­tia­tive that when we come back in 10 years' time to cel­e­brate his 100th birth­day, we might be cel­e­brat­ing a true resur­gence in West In­dies crick­et."