If there was one Test-class fast bowler who deserves more than any other to put his feet up and enjoy a long, peaceful retirement, it would be difficult to look any further than Courtney Andrew Walsh.

While most seamers of his ilk reach their peak by the time they?re 30 or close to it, the great Jamaican arguably bowled faster for longer than anybody in cricket history.

He has been called a physiological phenomenon ? and a glance at his quite staggering career statistics certainly bears this out.

In 137 Test matches, he bowled the small matter of 30,019 balls ? over 5,000 overs ? taking 517 wickets in process. This, of course, was a world record for a short time before his Herculean efforts were usurped by the Warne/Muralitharan show which continues to this day.

If you add Walsh?s One Day International and first class workload to his Test figures, it works out at a cool 126,284 deliveries.

Assuming his approach to the wicket was a minimum of 20 yards long, this means that he would have covered at least 1,600 miles during the course of a 17-year career bowling his heart out for Jamaica, the West Indies and English county side Gloucestershire.

Now 43 years old, the man has thrown himself into retirement with the same enthusiasm and vigour with which he approached his cricket.

As one of Texan billionaire Allen Stanford?s cricketing ?legends?, Walsh has been monitoring his homeland?s preparation for the Stanford 20-20 tournament in Antigua this July and was in Bermuda over the weekend assisting both Lance Gibbs and Richie Richardson on a three-day training camp with the national team.

He left early Monday morning to fulfil a similar function in the British Virgin Islands and will return to Jamaica at the end of the week to keep on eye on his popular sports bar in downtown Kingston.

When you factor in annual three-month stints coaching Australia Under 15s and Under 19s, as well as spells in the Sky Sports? commentary box during the English summer, it is clear Walsh has no intention of slowing down.

?I?m enjoying retirement really,? he said while supping on a Budweiser in the lobby bar of the Fairmont Hamilton Princess.

?Of course I miss certain things about playing, particularly the camaraderie of the dressing room ? which is difficult to replace. But I was definitely ready to finish back in 2001. I?m not sure the fans were ready for it, but I kept going for as long as my body and my mind were able.

?The last few years I played were a difficult time for the team and Curtly (Ambrose) and I hung around for as long as we could to try and help the younger fast bowlers like Fidel Edwards and Reon King to come through. But there was only so long we could do that before it was time to step aside.?

The key to Walsh?s longevity at the highest level was his almost limitless reserves of stamina and an economical action which placed minimal strain on his body while still allowing him to generate decent pace in the air and off the deck.

He was by no means in the same league speed-wise as the likes of Andy Roberts, Michael Holding, Malcolm Marshall or a young Patrick Patterson, but he was certainly as dependable and even more relentlessly accurate ? learning as he got older how to move the ball both ways off the seam from just short of a good length.

Early in his Test career he was the willing, unspectacular workhorse: volunteering to bowl uphill, into the wind while his more explosive and high-profile bowling partners charged in from the other end to batter many a quivering batsman.

Graduating to the new ball around 1993, he soon emerged from his stock-bowler shell and ultimately formed one of the most lethal opening partnerships in Test match history with Ambrose, taking 421 wickets between them in only 49 Tests.

Many of those who watched him on his last tour of England during the epic summer series of 2000, agreed that it was the best he had ever bowled at Test level.

He was 37 at the time.

?I think what kept me going was mainly my absolute love for the game,? he said.

?It didn?t matter who I was playing for, I just loved to be out there bowling and competing and that enjoyment never really went away. Even in my mid 30s when people were asking me when I was going to hang up my boots, I had no intention of giving it up because I loved it so much.

?I worked very hard as well to keep myself fit and strong and I was lucky in the sense that I was blessed with a body which could cope. I never had any major injuries which is unusual for somebody bowling fast at the top level for so long.

?When I was younger playing for Jamaica, I just used to let the ball go as fast as I could and I think I was up there as one of the quickest in the Caribbean. But when I made my debut for the West Indies (against Australia in 1984 at the WACA ground in Perth) I came into a team which already had those sort of bowlers and it became my job to bowl longer spells from one end and be as accurate as possible while the likes of Marshall and Joel Garner ran in from the other.

?I didn?t have a problem with that because I was there to do what the team needed me to do. But I did become a better bowler as I got older because with experience I began to understand what I was capable of doing and what my strengths were.

?That last tour of England I felt totally in control of what I was doing. The wickets were all helpful and the ball moved around a lot off the seam but I had rarely felt better in terms of rhythm throughout my career.

?It didn?t bother me not getting the recognition when I was younger. As far as I was concerned I was there to do a particular job for the team and I think I did what I was supposed to do.?

Like most West Indians who played or grew up in a time when the quality of their cricket was unsurpassed, Walsh has watched in frustration as the current crop of Test cricketers have failed to live up to the standards that the region as a whole demands.

Including their last defeat at the hands of a savvy and increasingly successful New Zealand side earlier this week, Shivnarine Chanderpaul?s men have now lost eight consecutive Test matches.

Their only real superstar, meanwhile, Brian Lara, looks a jaded shadow of his former self having scored only seven runs in his last four innings.

Though they tried their hardest to arrest the slide, even the superhuman efforts of Walsh and Ambrose in the latter stages of their careers were rarely enough.

The reasons for the decline in standards has been debated ad nauseum, but Walsh certainly was not prepared to hold back when offering his explanation.

He had little time for the well-rehearsed arguments of those who say that the influx of cable television and the attraction of the more glitzy, scholarship-ridden American sports have undermined the importance of cricket to modern West Indian culture.

?I have heard that so many times and it?s just not true,? he said.

?These things are cyclical ? always have been and always will be. It was always going to be difficult to maintain the level of success we had in the 70s and 80s and a lot of young players have come in who have not yet reached the standards of past teams.

?The problem is not talent. There are plenty of good players around. The real problem is that we don?t seem to learn from our mistakes.

?They know what the problems are but just don?t seem to be doing anything about them. The same bad shots are being played over and over again and the bowlers are still bowling one or two bad balls an over which at Test level gets punished.

?Somebody like Fidel Edwards has got real talent but it seems to be taking him a bit longer than expected to produce. It?s been a bad few years but I?m not that worried. I think West Indies cricket will come good again.?

He has little direct contact with the West Indian side anymore ? though his ?I?ve never been asked? response hints that he would be more than willing to give them the benefit of his considerable experience and expertise.

Instead, he has focused his attention on the Stanford revolution ? the Texan billionaire?s $28 million financial injection into regional cricket which will culminate in the inaugural Stanford 20-20 competition in July involving 19 countries.

There are those who have viewed the Texan entrepreneur?s sudden and spectacular intervention with scepticism.

But as a resident of Antigua for over two decades, he claims to have a special affinity with the region and to have watched the team?s demise with the same alarm as everybody else.

He has been adamant from the very beginning of the project that only by making cricket a lucrative and sexy sport will their fortunes begin to change.

Walsh certainly buys into this vision ? even if, as one of Stanford?s appointed ?legends? and a member of the executive board, you would expect nothing less.

?He?s definitely got his heart in the right place,? Walsh insisted.

?The money he is investing will make a big difference to cricket overall in the West Indies, particularly in terms of infrastructure. If in a few years? time his money means that we have first class facilities at a lot of our grounds and more young players drawn into the game then that will be fantastic.

?He?s working in collaboration with the West Indies Cricket Board as well so hopefully it will work out into something really positive for everybody. It?s good also that he has got a lot of the former players involved because we all have a role to play.

?He wants to make a difference, but his future involvement will depend on how well this year goes. Let?s hope it works out because we need people like Allen Stanford involved.?

Walsh?s latest visit was his third to the Island. Four years ago, not long after he finally retired, he played in a friendly game at Wellington Oval between a West Indies Select XI and the hosts St. George?s.

Even at half pace, he proved a handful for the local batsman, particularly on a wicket which resembled a ploughed field.

Walsh is glowing in his praise of Bermuda and her people ? although he looked a touch perturbed as he shielded himself from the cold wind that lashed the NSC for all of the training camp.

He spent most of his time working closely with the fast bowlers and is well aware that Bermuda are still searching for a wicket taker of genuine pace.

Like Gibbs, however, he was generally positive about what he saw ? while he left the national squad in absolutely no doubt over what it will take to compete at the World Cup and beyond.

?I really enjoyed working with them and I can see that the ability is there,? he said.

?They can definitely be competitive. Gus has done a very good job with them and Bermuda is very lucky to have somebody like him running things here. I?m sure he?s got a lot of credit for what he?s done and I hope he continues to do a good job.

?Looking at the bowlers, I saw one or two things which impressed me but overall I think there is still some work to do on their control.

?What our role was over the three days was not only to work with the players but also to talk to them about life as a professional cricketer and what is required to do well consistently.

?I think they?re all aware that they have to make a lot of sacrifices and it will come down to desire and how much they want to achieve.?

And if the national team players can muster even one tenth of the Jamaican?s insatiable hunger for success then they may just hold their own on the grandest stage of all.