Sir Curtly Elconn Lynwall Ambrose, KCN (born 21 September 1963) is a former cricketer from Antigua who played 98 Test matches for the West Indies. A fast bowler, he took 405 Test wickets at an average of 20.99 and topped the ICC Player Rankings for much of his career to be rated the best bowler in the world. His great height--he is 6 feet 7 inches (2.01 m) tall--allowed him to make the ball bounce unusually high after he delivered it; allied to his pace and accuracy, it made him a difficult bowler for batsmen to face. A man of few words during his career, he was notoriously reluctant to speak to journalists.

The West Indies toured Australia in 1992-93, recovering from losing the second Test to win the final two matches and take the series 2-1. The team also won the annual World Series Cup. In the first three Tests, Ambrose was hampered by pitches which did not suit his bowling and, according to Tony Cozier writing in Wisden, was often unlucky when he bowled, although he took five for 66 in the first Test. In the final two Tests, he took 19 wickets. In the fourth he took ten wickets, including six for 74 in the first innings; in the second innings, he took three wickets in 19 deliveries and the West Indies won the match by one run. According to Cozier, the captains of both teams, Richie Richardson and Allan Border, "paid tribute to the man who made the result possible: Ambrose consolidated his reputation as the world's leading bowler". On the first day of the decisive final Test, Ambrose took seven wickets at the cost of one run from 32 deliveries and finished with figures of seven for 25. Cozier described it as "one of Test cricket's most devastating spells". West Indies won by an innings and Ambrose was named man of the series, having taken 33 wickets to equal the record in an Australia-West Indies Test series. He topped the West Indian bowling averages with an average of 16.42. Cozier described Ambrose's performance as "instrumental in winning [the series]" and his bowling as "flawless".  In the one-day tournament, Ambrose took 18 wickets at 13.38. He took eight wickets in the two-match final--both games were won by the West Indies. In the first final, he took five for 32, driven to bowl with more hostility when the Australian batsman Dean Jones asked him to remove his white wristbands while bowling. He followed up with three for 26 in the second match to be named player of the finals. After a one-day tournament in South Africa, West Indies returned home for Test and ODI series against Pakistan. The ODI series was drawn, but the West Indies defeated Pakistan 2-0 in the Tests. Ambrose took nine wickets at 23.11 to be fifth in the team bowling averages. The Wisden report suggested that he was suffering from fatigue after his team's busy schedule, but although not at his best, he continued to take important wickets. For Northamptonshire in 1993, Ambrose was second in the team first-class bowling averages with 59 wickets at 20.45.  Having developed a slower ball, and using the yorker more sparingly, Ambrose took five wickets in three games as West Indies won an ODI tournament in Sharjah in late October and November 1993. The team competed in another tournament, this time in India, later that November. They finished as runners-up, and Ambrose took four wickets in five matches. Immediately following this, West Indies toured Sri Lanka to play three ODIs and a Test, a rain-ruined match in which Ambrose took three wickets.

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