PETER ROEBUCK, regarded by many as the finest cricket writer of his generation, fell to his death from a hotel window in Cape Town on Saturday night after being questioned by police about an alleged sexual assault.

Roebuck, who had written on cricket for the Herald since 1984, had been covering the Australian tour of South Africa for the paper. He was also commentating on the tour for ABC radio.

A Cape Town detective and a uniformed police officer from the sexual crimes unit began speaking with Roebuck, 55, in his room at the Southern Sun Hotel, Newlands, about 9pm.

Roebuck, who was agitated, asked a fellow cricket journalist for help. ''Can you come down to my room quickly? I've got a problem,'' he said. He asked for help to find a lawyer and for contact to be made with the students he helped to house in Pietermaritzburg, near Durban.