Fuarnado Roberts....The first Caribbean Champion

I first saw Fuarnado Roberts sometime in the late 1970's when I was just seeing the game played at a high level for the first time. As a boy, I had made the 3 hour drive from rural Jamaica, Port Antonio to be exact all the way to Kingston just to watch the Lovebird tournament, a predecessor to the Pro Tour, a unique tournament featuring the worlds best players and a few pretty decent ones from Jamaica as well.
Here amidst such stars as Stellan Bengsston, Kjell Johanssen, Stellwag, Dragutin Surbek, Karakesevic, Desmond Douglas and Dan Seemiler was a homegrown Jamaican holding his own.

Playing against 1971 world champion, Stellan Bengtsson, one of the most feared attacking experts of the day, this throwback old style chopper more than held his own. Roberts was able to chop back Bengtssons loops from long range, every now and then mixing in the floater and whenever Bengtsson made a drop shot, would run in and pick hit, often with the no look backhand shot, this against a world champion, and in front of a loud and raucous home crowd!

And it wasn't the first time.

Legend has it, several years prior, the then reigning world champion Richard Bergmann was vacationing in Jamaica when a brash young native, Robbie turned up at his hotel, with the media in tow, publicly challenging him to a duel. Bergman took the bait and in front of a crowded Oceana hotel ballroom and the media proceeded to get served Jamaican style.

So incensed was Bergman that he promptly went into training when he got back to England and came back to Jamaica better prepared to exact revenge.

Robbie would then migrate to the USA where he became captain of the USA team to the Birmingham worlds and was instrumental in the careers of USA greats Danny Seemiler and the Boggans.

I next saw Robbie many years later when he returned to live in Jamaica. He hadn't played in years but he wanted to knock and I was one of the first players to play him. within a few minutes of playing all the elements were there, the graceful movement, the deception, the spin and yes, even the pick hit shot.

 Our association grew after that. We worked together to win many titles, league titles,  national championships playing for JCYA, Utech among others.
Robbie maintained his presence in Jamaica table tennis coaching directly many champions, in particular Ludlow Bailey, Michael Cai and myself.
Robbie coached from the prep school level all the way up to the senior level with equal commitment.

The mystery with Robbie for me, which I guess I will never figure out is this. Why did Robbie not raise any defensive players?
I've seen him teach penhold, shake offensive, pips,  but of the hundreds of students I saw him coach, I never saw him teach anyone to chop.
Now why do you suppose that was?