Fearless

Martin Chandler | 9:15am GMT 02 February 2025

Published: 2024
Pages: 455
Author: Amarnath, Mohinder and Amarnath, Rajender
Publisher: Harper Sport
Rating: 3.5 stars

If truth be told I probably knew more about his father, Lala, than I did about Mohinder ‘Jimmy’ Amarnath before I opened this one. I had already read a biography of Lala, written by his youngest son, Rajinder (‘Johnny’), who also assisted Jimmy with Fearless.

I knew of course that there was also an older brother, Surinder, ‘Tommy’, who had also played Test cricket for India, but other than one season with Burnley in the Lancashire League we never saw Tommy in England. We saw Jimmy here with India, but whilst his man of the match winning performances in the semi-final and final of the historic 1983 World Cup linger in the memory he never played county cricket, didn’t tour here in 1982 and on his visits in 1979 and 1986 didn’t pull up any trees.

But I did also know about his heroics in the Caribbean in 1982/83, and his reputation as one of the bravest of batsmen. I was also aware of his travails the following year when, West Indies paying a return visit to India, he made five ducks and just a single run in his sixth innings against West Indies. What, I have long wondered, was going on there?

In the manner of all traditional autobiographies Fearless charts a chronological course through Amarnath’s life. Lala, described in the title of one book about him as the Stormy Petrel of Indian Cricket, inevitably plays a major part in his family’s life and the development as cricketers of his three sons.

The Amarnath back story is not without interest, but I have to confess to having found the first quarter of Fearless hard work in places, and there came a time when I chose to skip forward to the chapter on that 1982/83 visit to the Caribbean. At that point my intention was to find such answers as there might be to the questions I started out with and leave it at that.

Naturally I expected the chapter to be interesting, but I didn’t expect to be faced with what I can only describe as an object lesson in how a cricketer should approach the subject of a Test series in an autobiography. 

A mere observer, and even to a certain extent a biographer, can only really give an account of the cricket on a tour. Amarnath does that of course, but looking at it from his own perspective, and his impressions of those of his teammates. Outside the Tests there are entertaining insights aplenty none of which could ever find their way into a book other than an autobiography.

Amarnath clearly, and deservedly, enjoyed himself in the Caribbean, so what did he have to say about that extraordinary bad run a year later against the opposition he had bested in their own back yard? The approach is similar even if the story and the tone are rather darker. I suppose I should really have guessed, but the explanation was nothing more and nothing less than burn out.

So then I went back to the start of Amarnath’s Test career and am pleased to be able to say that the chapters devoted to each of the series in which he was involved are more of the same, descriptions of cricket matches and the touring experience, told with the same revealing insider’s view that characterised the accounts of 82/83 and 83/84.

One of the slightly surprising aspects of Amarnath’s career is that after, at 37, he played his last Test he was selected for another 22 ODIs over the greater part of two years. Not a man who always enjoyed the easiest of relationships with selectors the last subject the book tackles, and it is a fascinating story that is particularly well written, is the disciplinary issues at the end of Amarnath’s career after he criticised those selectors as being a bunch of jokers.

So all in all Fearless is actually a most enjoyable read. It isn’t quite perfect though, for three reasons, albeit the first I had barely noticed, but I am told that to the dedicated student of Indian cricket history there are a few factual errors. Second a few of the more controversial incidents do not name those involved. I got the impression that that will not bother those same dedicated historians because I suspect enough clues are left for them to know who is involved, but others may, as I was, be left feeling a little frustrated at times.

And my final point may, I have to concede, be a complete non point depending on what Amarnath’s future plans are, but I was little disappointed that Fearless, to all intents and purposes, ended with Amarnath’s international career. On what he has done since, and his opinions on what has unfolded in Indian cricket after his retirement he remains silent. But maybe those are matters that are left out because they are due to feature in a follow up? I certainly hope so.