Watching cricket at the Wankhede

I have never watched cricket in a stadium.

I remember when Sachin made his debut. That was around the time I started paying attention to cricket. It is now 22 years and he will be gone soon. Even Dravid and Laxman will be gone soon. They have been wonderful heroes. For once I decided I must go to a stadium. I must see them bat once in real life, before they go away.

I live in Pune, a few hours from Mumbai, making the Wankhede Test my obvious choice. I bought a season ticket via the internet, but of course work does not allow you to take five days off. So day three was chosen. A full day of India batting and maybe even the amazing century of centuries might happen.

In India, it is still not easy to get inside a cricket stadium. I woke up at 4.30am. Took a 5.30am bus to Mumbai from Pune. Reached Dadar (Mumbai's transport hub) and then took the local train to Churchgate station, which adjoins Wankhede stadium. Reached Churchgate around 9.40am.

India still loves Sachin and so it still loves Test cricket. The road outside the Churchgate station was full of people desperately looking for tickets. I felt great having the prized ticket in my hand.

The first step is to submit your printed online confirmation to get the actual ticket. This was luckily easy for me. I saw that office quickly. But if you are unlucky then you could be roaming around for half an hour searching for it.

The next step is to find your gate to get inside the stadium. For me this was a one-kilometre walk around. There was a long queue at the gate. Ahead in the queue, I see something crazy. College kids just throw down their bags on the pavement, and enter the stadium.

I find out that bags are not allowed in. Also, they do not have a locker facility. There were more than a hundred bags lying on the roadside. I find it crazy that you have to leave your bag lying there for a whole day, and hope it’ll be safe. That too in Mumbai.

I was also tempted to leave my bag there on the roadside, but I had made some elaborate preparations for this big day. There was a camera and a binocular in my bag and I didn’t dare leave it on the pavement.

Churchgate station has no lockers. Everybody is wary of getting entangled in any terror activity. So, no shopkeeper will keep a bag for the day, even for 100 rupees. There is no hotel nearby.

So I have to go to CST station, two kilometres away. The clerk there would not take a bag without a lock. So I buy a lock. Then I make a hole in the bag, so that the bag can appear to be "locked". Then I rush back to Wankhede and am greeted by an even longer queue. It is more than half a kilometre long. It is past 12 now. The queue hardly moves. For once I am angry with this country, absolutely furious. Nothing, absolutely nothing works here. It is 12.30 now. The first session is over.

But two sessions are still there.

In the queue everyone had only one thought. Sachin ki entry nahi miss honee chahiye. Jaldi chalo andar. (Can’t miss Sachin’s entry, get in soon.) It was probably like the anticipation for an Amitabh movie in 80s or a Rajni movie today.

I get inside and find that Gambhir and Dravid are batting. Entry miss nahi huwi (didn’t miss the entry).

The first thing that strikes you is the beauty of the ground. A cricket stadium has a beautiful atmosphere inside.

The second thing was the size of cricketers. They were not special in anyway. Just average guys. Some of the West Indies players are really small and scrawny.

Test matches seem to have quite a relaxed pace. The West Indies fielders stood around lazily.

We used to play some good competitive weekend cricket with tennis ball. Many of us were passionate guys, running fast singles and chasing the ball hard to save the boundary. Then there would be a few lazy ones who would try to get a fielding position in the shade where the ball doesn’t come often.

The fielders on the ground looked like the lazy ones in our team.

A real cricket ground is also not very large. Our weekend cricket ground was almost as big, though we did not have runs behind the stumps.

Things started brightly. It is pleasant to watch cricket in the winter sun. Dravid reached 13,000 runs in Test cricket. The cheers went on and on. I am glad I could be a part of it. Then he reached 1000 runs for this year, more cheers.

Gambhir hits a couple of crisp boundaries. The crowd became affectionate and started calling him Gauti and then Gautiya with a Mumbai lisp. Then he gets out, and the crowd knows who is going to come.

The affection is forgotten. The West Indies team and the crowd, everybody is happy. Actually the crowd is happier than the West Indies team.

Sachin walks in. I think most of us will recognise him even if he wears a mask. We know each of his little mannerisms. The way he walks, stands, jogs or looks up to the sky. The crowd erupts. The cheers go on and on. For some time, each of his runs are cheered.

Test cricket seems to be a game of skill. You hardly feel any power. It is all timing. Frankly you end up thinking that batting is quite easy. Let me go in and face an over, you think.

Bowling looks quite difficult. Whatever they do, batsmen easily hit them around. Ravi Rampaul though was able to send down a few good bouncers.

Then Dravid got out. Everybody feels for him. The crowd in a stadium is different from people watching TV cricket. They love the players more and criticise less. I think many were like me, coming to see these three heroes for one last time.

Laxman comes in and I think he gets almost as hearty a welcome as Sachin. Vee Vee S ... Vee Vee S... Vee Vee S. Inside the stadium, this chanting resonates and creates an eerie effect.

Batting continues to look easy. Poor Fidel Edwards gets tonked around every time he comes in with his extra pace. Then batsmen slow down towards the end of day. You could easily doze off around this time. But it is a happy contented sleep.

The day is over, but we get an unexpected treat. Virat Kohli and Dhoni come out for practice. We stand around for a while. Some girl keeps screaming Virat … Virat.

It is time to leave now, and a long journey back home. It was 11.30 pm when I reach home. A kind of warm happy afterglow envelops me.

Back in college one used to be really happy. While leaving college, I had thought that I would re-create that feeling again and again. Today I have to admit that I haven’t been able to do so.

But once in a while you come across a really happy day. Like this one. Cricket in the stadium is a far more beautiful sport than what you see in TV. Try it once.