Once upon a time in Cricket Fan-dome
15th February 2015 brought home a realization. India’s ICC- Cricket World-cup campaign had begun with a bang. A convincing victory against the arch rivals. While the social media in India made fun of Rameez Raja and chanted “mauka mauka mauka”, I began contemplating what had changed in me since the moment MS Dhoni hit Nuwan Kulsekara for a 6 to clinch the world cup nearly 4 years ago.
My earliest memory of cricket is a world cup memory. India vs Kenya 1996. Sachin scored a century, Jadeja had added a fifty and India comfortably won the game. I was just under 6 when this game was played. I must have watched cricket before this game as i remember being a Sachin fan. I have some cricket memories before this game, but i cannot be sure whether i remember those games from following them live or just as a collection of memories fused with highlights seen in the coming 15 years as a cricket fanatic. Memory being a tricky concept isn’t just what you remember about a time in the past, but it also encompasses the broader emotional and informative thinking about that “time in the past”. So i assume that memories of me watching matches like “Hero cup final 94” are fictitious because i don’t remember my emotions during this game unlike the WC-96 Ind-Ken game.
Being a cricket fanatic didn’t just mean being glued to television sets when the match was being broadcast. For me it also meant learning to read marathi well. We didn’t subscribe to English newspaper in my childhood. It also meant the ebb and surge of emotions as a function of Indian-Cricket. The 1 or 2 months of cricket free time seemed to stretch like years. Even trailing 2–0 in a test series didn’t deter me from following through with same vigor. Waking up @ 4am to watch India beaten in New Zealand in 2002 in 3days or remaining awake till 2am to watch India famous win @ PortofSpain. The sad loss in WCFinal-2003 on my birthday didnt dampen cricket for me though it saddened my day. Same can be said of India’s loss to Srilanka on the same day in 2007 which included Sachin being bamboozled by a 150+k mps Dilhara Fernando ball for 0 and India crashing out of WC2007. The cycle of the game went on. The heartbreak @ Chennai against Pakistan where Indian tail fell like a pack of dominos after Sachin’s wicket was reduced greatly by the heroic 10Wicket-match-winning haul by Jumbo @ Delhi in the following match. Though undoubtfully the spell indian cricket enjoyed from 2001–2004 under Ganguly and 2007–08–2011 under Kumble and Dhoni as the crowning achievement of Indian Cricket. India began winning test matches overseas. Nothing pleased me more than 5 idyllic days of watching dukes ball cricket from 330 to 1030 in the Home of cricket (The Dukes ball is used for Test cricket in England; In India we use the S.G ball, The Australian kookaburra ball is used in all other countries. I believe that the best contest between bat and ball happens with the Dukes ball). I still remember the India-England test series 2002 and 2007 and Ashes 2005 with utmost nostalgia.
If 2007 world-cup disaster was the nadir of the Indian cricket fan, then things could only improve from then on. And they did. India won a Test series in England under Dravid. India won the Inaugural T20WC in September in SA. That was followed with the Perth victory and winning the CB series. Indian cricket had never reached such consistent high plateaus. If anything this was the foreshadowing of even better things to come. India beat Australia twice in India in tests. Drew 2 Test series with the Proteas. (Sadly India played only 2 and 3 test series with them). We even wrestled the No-1 spot in both rankings. Meanwhile the once written of Sachin was in his purplest patch since the 97–98 season. Scoring runs in Tests ODIs and IPL, he kept pleasing his gigantic fan base. Sachin and Gambhir facing the wrath of Steyn and Morkel @ Capetown with elan to set up an incredible series win (Which wasnt to be; Alas Messrs Kallis and Boucher)with the series poised @ 1–1 was extremely fullfilling. The natural course for this buildup of performance was bound toward the WorldCup dream which was realized in early April 2011. The post WorldCup party lasted for days. But fortunately or unfortunately within days the focus was on IPL, thanks to the advertisers and organizers who were quick to exploit the euphoria of World-cup win. Never a huge fan of the 20 over format, i had nonetheless followed previous IPLs. But if anything was overkill it was the IPL in 2011. The somewhat scripted drama, the page 3 news, the frequent controversies, all conspired to dampen the spark caused by pure cricket. Then began the sudden fall of Indian cricket with consecutive 4–0 drubbings in the 2011–12 season.
Today, a few days after the comfortable win against Pakistan, i sit contemplating why don’t i feel any longing, connection or zeal toward Indian cricket (even cricket in general). The answer is multi-faced. Maybe the ambition of the Indian cricket fan was completed emphatically with Dhoni’s 6. The abysmal performance in England and Australia, (my 2 favorite cricketing locations) once a regular occurrence now felt unworthy of world champions. Having supported this very team after numerous debacles, suddenly i found the rapid fall from the cricket zenith too much. Engaging in a more active social life, I found following Test cricket which i never missed, difficult. Excess of 300+ scores in 1Day games has also made the contest between bat and ball less appealing. Cricket (At least the one Indian cricket team played) since 2011, seemed to focus on economy rate instead of strike rate. All these reasons combined have made cricket much less appealing today.
I tend to feel ashamed at myself when i fail to enjoy the wonderful spells of hostile fast bowling provided by Anderson , Steyn and Johnson. Cricket has outgrown me or is it the other way around ?
