Southern hospitality greets English tourists in final Test

December has traditionally been a time for revelry in Chennai. There is the kaarthigai deepam (festival of lights), Christmas, and the annual Margazhi festival, a resplendent celebration of classical music and dance during the ninth month on the Tamil calendar.

But the ravaging floods in early December last year, which claimed hundreds of lives, scarred conventional considerations. Memories of the Boxing Day Tsunami in 2004 were quickly revisited, and people began to suspect Chennai was in an abusive relationship with the last month of the calendar. December 2016 has already given enough heft to such theories.

There was the death of J Jayalalithaa, the chief minister of Tamil Nadu, on December 5. About a week later, Cyclone Vardah unleashed itself, and although not in the same magnitude of the floods in 2015, the storm system did considerable damage. Cricket, like the other December festivities, wasn't a priority when people were still grappling with the aftermath.

But, for a cricket-starved city - since 2008, Chennai has hosted only three Tests, among the lowest for a traditional Test centre - its first Test in nearly four years was a chance to heal. And so the MA Chidambaram Stadium was restored on a war-footing - the crumpled chairs and tree debris were cleared up, bulbs were replaced and sight-screens mended. Just when congratulatory back-slaps were in order, nature allowed itself some schadenfreude: the skies had opened up with less than 12 hours to go for the Test match. The ground staff insisted these would be short, sharp showers, and that the pitch and outfield would remain unaffected.

The rain relented soon after, but some things wouldn't change. Like the mysterious impasse over the locked I, J and K stands - phrases like "structural soundness" and "setback space" have been added to our vocabulary, but we are none the wiser; and the murmurs over how Chepauk isn't allotted many international games because N Srinivasan, the former BCCI and ICC boss and president of the host state association, isn't a favourite of the current establishment.

There will likely be endless debates on the rights and wrongs of things, but this much is certain: Chennai hasn't been denied the pleasure of hosting a Test match. Not this time.

Knowledgeable Chennai crowd. The phrase is cliché to a point where it is best used as a hashtag at the end of a snarky punchline. However, more than the "knowledgeable" part, it's Chepauk's remarkably non-partisan approach to consuming cricket that has been fascinating.

As a ten-year-old, I was in thrall of Wasim Akram, Saeed Anwar and Saqlain Mushtaq during That Test in 1999. A cousin and I were the only people in the stands who wildly cheered Sachin Tendulkar's dismissal in the second innings, even adding for good measure: "Jeetega bhai jeetega, Pakistan jeetega" (Pakistan will emerge victorious). But, instead of any hostility - it helped we were children - all we got were benign smiles. The shared appreciation of Akram's perseverance and Mushtaq's wiles eventually culminated in a most gracious ovation from the crowd after Pakistan's thrilling heist.

But I have never watched a Test match from the stands of Chepauk in the post-IPL era. There was the India-England game in December 2008 when Tendulkar and Yuvraj Singh masterfully gunned down a total of 387, but the IPL was still in its infancy then. Having watched quite a few Chennai Super Kings games since, fan partisanship - as you would expect in the IPL - has become a lot fiercer, especially against big-ticket rivals like Royal Challengers Bangalore or Mumbai Indians.

It is also not uncommon to see Indian fans remain aloof to the visiting team's successes these days. In Mohali, for instance, during the recent India-New Zealand ODI, the crowd turned mute whenever New Zealand scored runs or took wickets. There was curiosity to see which Chennai fan would turn up for the first-day, first-show of this Test match - the archetypal cricket tragic or the CSK die-hard.

As R Ashwin had predicted ahead of the match, the decibel levels hit the roof whenever he made contact with the ball, while M Vijay, the other local boy, duly received his share of applause as well. The crowd, having nicely warmed up, revved up their vocal chords once England lost their openers within the first hour in the morning. Joe Root, however, was quickly changing the narrative - when he cracked a square cut and a late steer off a yorker, the claps were just as resounding.

A number of characters that form the staple at a Chepauk Test could be found. There was the middle-aged gentleman jumping up and down, and calling out players by their nicknames - "Ash…Ash, Cooky" - and waving his hand furiously, hoping to catch their attention. There were the pundits - a father and son, and two elderly gentlemen - who were animatedly dissecting Amit Mishra's lack of bite and Root's ability to pick the length - respectfully. With India making more than one DRS referral, they had more than one occasion to debate the merits of the umpire's call.

And then there were the group of youngsters that countered the Barmy Army's singing with a fired-up rendition of the chant that is unmistakably Chennai, and Chepauk: 'Gumthalakadi gala gala gala, hoo haa, hoo haa.'

But, as the afternoon wore on and Root, Mooen Ali and Jonny Bairstow piled on the runs, each landmark was celebrated with a standing ovation. Once Moeen completed his hundred, both Indian and English fans rose spontaneously to hail his effort and didn't take their seats for the next couple of minutes. By the time the day's play neared its conclusion, a few local fans had already exchanged numbers with their English counterparts and promised to keep in touch.

Surely, there will be no let-up in the 'Gumthalakadi...' chants , and they will only grow louder over the weekend. Just as relentless will be those eager enquiries about Yorkshire cricket or Haseeb Hameed. The cricket-crazy ghost of the Chepauk past is alive and well.