Published: Jun 29, 2013, 11:13 AM (IST)
Edited: Feb 23, 2016, 06:47 PM (IST)
John Jameson, born June 30, 1941, was an aggressive Warwickshire and England batsman. Abhishek Mukherjee looks back at the man who faced the first ball in World Cup cricket.
Jimmy Jameson was born in Belgaum, Karnataka. His wife Sylvia was born in Deolali, Maharashtra. Both of them were active sportspersons: Jimmy was a regular feature in the Aga Khan Hockey Tournament (there used to be a Jimmy Jameson Trophy in Parel, Bombay), and later umpired in the Tokyo and Mexico City Olympics. Sylvia, on the other hand, was a prominent tennis player and swimmer.
It was no surprise that their son John, born in Byculla, Bombay, would also take up sports, John, however, took up cricket. He had moved to England for good in 1955. Despite his pride in his Indian origin and keen interest in cricket in the sub-continent he has not visited his birthplace very often. In fact, John’s eldest daughter was the first Jameson born outside India in the 20th century.
With a broad frame and very powerful forearms, Jameson was a hard-hitting batsman. He did hit the ball very hard and often compromised temperament for strokeplay, leading to the dearth of long innings in his career. With openers like Geoff Boycott, Dennis Amiss, John Edrich, and Brian Luckhurst all in the reckoning, the cardinal sin of a low First-Class average could not make up for medium-pace bowling, safe slip-fielding, and occasional wicket-keeping skills.
In 361 First-Class matches, Jameson had scored 18,941 runs at 33.34 with 33 hundreds. He had also picked up 89 wickets at 42.49 and had effected 256 victims (both with the gloves and without). These numbers are certainly not exceptional. However, had he been born a decade or so later, he would probably have made a fine all-rounder in the shorter version of the game with his clean hitting and other abilities.
Early days
After shifting to England, Jameson studied at Taunton School but later shifted to Warwickshire. He had an unimpressive his First-Class debut against Oxford University at Birmingham in 1960, and then played another equally disappointing match next season against Cambridge University.
He eventually won his Warwickshire cap in 1964 and promptly responded with a 133 not out — his maiden First-Class hundred — and 3 for 40. He topped that with 165 and 37 not out against Oxford University and 99 against Scotland in successive matches at Edgbaston.
He played on for Warwickshire throughout the 1960s, never really shining but keeping his place nevertheless in a Warwickshire side that boasted of Amiss, Mike Smith, and John Whitehouse — more as an all-rounder than anything else.
International cricket
The surprise came in 1970. Jameson got to know that he was a contender for the India Test team on the merit of his birth. In his own words, “No one ever approached me. I was informed by one of the England selectors that India have made enquires.” He was not willing, though — on the grounds that playing for India after years of growing up in England would be ‘unfair’.
Then came the lucky break: Boycott pulled out after the first Test against India at Lord’s, and Jameson made his debut in the second Test at Old Trafford, scoring 15 and 28. He was retained for the next Test at The Oval.
After the initial nerves had gone off Jameson came into his elements in the third Test. Despite losing Luckhurst early he batted brilliantly putting up 106 with Edrich for the second wicket. As he got his eyes in the strokes started flowing, culminating in two sixes off Bishan Bedi before lunch. He eventually got run out for a 152-ball 82, scored out of 139 during his stay at the wicket.
He began belligerently in the second innings as well but managed just 16 before he was run out again. Jameson remains the only English batsman to be run out twice in the same Test. Bhagwat Chandrasekhar than ran through the England line-up and gave India their first series win on English soil. The 82 would remain Jameson’s only international fifty, and he was out of contention once again.
Jameson’s peak came in 1973 when he scored 1,948 runs at 48.70 with 5 centuries from 25 matches. He was called up for ODI debut that season against West Indies at The Oval where he scored 28. However, he was also selected for the West Indies tour the next season.
Jameson had an average tour of West Indies, scoring 325 runs at 25 from 7 matches. His best performance came against Barbados at Kensington Oval where stood tall amidst a 10-wicket defeat, top-scoring with 91 in the first innings. Despite his failure he was selected for the second and third Tests at Sabina Park and Kensington Oval but failed miserably with 73 runs from 4 innings. He never played another Test.
That stand with Kanhai
Jameson etched his name in history in the match against Gloucestershire in 1974. Warwickshire lost Neal Abberley for a duck after Smith won the toss and decided to bat. Rohan Kanhai strode out, and tore the visitors apart in the company of Jameson.
Jameson later called it a ‘dream innings’. This was the era with a 100-over restriction on the first innings, and the two held nothing back, plundering runs with aplomb. Records kept on tumbling: Don Bradman and Bill Ponsford’s 451-run partnership in the Ashes Test at The Oval in 1934 (the highest partnership for the second wicket on English soil) was bettered and so was Kamal Bhandarkar and BB Nimbalkar’s 455 against Kathiawar at Poona in 1948-49.
Jameson and Kanhai put up an unbeaten 465-run partnership for the second wicket — a world record that stood till Zahir Alam and Lalchand Rajput added 475 for Assam against Tripura in 1991-92. It was unfortunate that Warwickshire were allowed to bat for only 100 overs and had to stop at 465 for one. Bob Willis and Eddie Hemmings then bowled them to an innings victory.
The year 1974 was also Jameson’s benefit season for Warwickshire. He received a purse of £13,500.
Setting the World Cup off
Jameson was selected for the World Cup squad of 1975 and made history facing the first ball in World Cup history. Madan Lal was the bowler; Jameson scored a 42-ball 21 and England won by 202 runs. Given another chance against New Zealand, he struggled against Richard Collinge before falling to him for a 31-ball 11. That ended his international career.
He ended his First-Class career with a flourish scoring 1,727 runs from 23 matches at 43.17, signing off in style with a 103 against Glamorgan at Edgbaston in his final First-Class match. The tally of seven hundreds he scored was his highest in a single season.
After retirement he became a coach at Taunton School.
Later career
Jameson took a keen interest in the development of cricket in the subcontinent and toured Bangladesh twice in three seasons. He also assumed the role of the Bangladesh coach and played a crucial part in the development of her cricket in the early stages.
He also became a First-Class umpire and later went on to coach Sussex. He also went on to become MCC’s Assistant Secretary in 1989 and then took up a role in their Laws’ Sub-Committee. He was called at the hearing of Darrell Hair following the controversial Test at The Oval between England and Pakistan in 2007.
After the long-drawn, meandering defence of Hair Jameson was called up to the witness-box and put down a few lucid words, clearing doubts of all sorts. As he tried to find a bus, the reporters remarked that his statement was “short and sweet”.
“Like my innings!” came the response.
The no-nonsense, outspoken, transparent attitude has not waned with age; and neither has the sense of humour.
(Abhishek Mukherjee is a cricket historian and Senior Cricket Writer at CricketCountry. He generally looks upon life as a journey involving two components – cricket and literature – though not as disjoint elements. A passionate follower of the history of the sport with an insatiable appetite for trivia and anecdotes, he has also a steady love affair with the incredible assortment of numbers that cricket has to offer. He also thinks he can bowl decent leg-breaks in street cricket, and blogs at http://ovshake.blogspot.in. He can be followed on Twitter at http://www.twitter.com/
