Ranchi, you beauty
A small town is infected by cricket fever and lives to tell the tale

The visiting team had the crowd's support - all because of this gentleman • BCB
In January 2013, Ranchi hosted its first international cricket match and praises were heaped from all over on the amazing new stadium and its state-of-the-art facilities. I watched on TV and felt extremely happy that finally Jharkhand, my state, could boast of a facility that could put it on the world map, and could complement MS Dhoni's status as the sporting ambassador of the region.
A tough question. The IPL is still a long way away from forging dedicated, passionate fan bases a la its global cousins, say the NBA or EPL. It becomes increasingly difficult for people like me, who have confused regional identities (schooling in Jamshedpur, college in Mumbai, working in Delhi, in my case). To complicate matters further, cricket icons of a particular region play for franchises in other cities.
On a slow pitch, Kolkata Knight Riders captain Gautam Gambhir read the conditions perfectly, getting in an extra spinner, Sachithra Senanayake, at the cost of in-form Eoin Morgan.
The occasional light drizzle had made the weather perfect to watch the match. Unfortunately the action in the middle didn't live up to the expectations. We had hoped for a high-scoring encounter, a Chris Gayle blitz or an AB de Villiers special, followed by a tight chase by Gambhir & Co. All we got was three sixes in the entire match - two from a team that had earlier hit a record number of sixes. I would most definitely have wanted a high-scoring encounter, or a Super Over, to make up for the low-scoring game.
I was eagerly waiting to see how Gayle would approach his Windies team-mate Narine. It was an anti-climax, to say the least, as Narine dismissed Gayle in his second over. Gayle's innings was a letdown since he took 36 balls to score 33, which was 1/3rd of what he usually notches up in a stay that long.
On a day when the boundaries were hard to come by, there was hardly a shot that stuck in memory. One that did matter though, was the last boundary of the match - a dead straight four that Ryan ten Doeschate hit over bowler Vinay Kumar to finish a tricky chase.
The town was infected by an anticipatory buzz for a week. There was a mad scramble for tickets - local papers had pictures of people camping overnight to get tickets, which reminded me of Wimbledon queues. It was refreshing to see since cricket matches hardly registers a blip on a metro's event radar. So considering all this, I expected a jam-packed stadium, but even at its peak, the stands were no more than 80% full. The guilty parties were mainly the VIP stands, where, I assume, the ease of getting tickets fails to motivate people to turn up and watch the game. It's a shame.
The experience was near-perfect. We walked in without any hassles or long lines. The stadium infrastructure, including the seating arrangement, was really good and we chose seats with a good view. It was heartening to see such spectator-friendly arrangements in my backyard. The ghosts of my horrifying experience in Jamshedpur in 2002, when the crowd threw bottles to express unhappiness at West Indies' win, were finally exorcised.
I know expecting the Allman Brothers Band to be played over the PA system is unlikely and wishful since it's the modern pop numbers that get the crowd on its feet. Still, I was horrified to hear Yo Yo Honey Singh numbers being blared here in Ranchi, an experience I thought would not haunt me outside Delhi. That's pop-culture for you.
The age for instant gratification make Twenty20s a perfect fit - exciting, entertaining and brief.
I love watching Test matches from the stands, and was there to savour the 4-0 whitewash against the Aussies at Kotla.
The cricket was a departure from the usual T20 matches. The bowlers looked in control throughout, keeping the run rate in check. The Knight Riders' slow bowlers spun a web around the Royal Challengers' batsmen and the Royal Challengers' bowlers gave little away when they bowled, except in a couple of overs when Jacques Kallis and Irfan Pathan broke the shackles. Since we end up judging a T20 solely by its entertainment value, I would say this one wasn't fun to watch, though the close finish did manage to keep the crowd on its feet till the last over.
7. 5 for the facilities and 2 for the match.
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