Adelaide bled blue this Sunday but amid all the hype and the hoopla, the noise and the din around Team India, one fact stood out tall and stark — no fan sported posters of anyone in the present Indian squad — no Rohit Sharma, no Virat Kohli not even MS Dhoni. Only the Indian Tricolour and face paint. Same was the case with the Pakistani fans who had just one poster at hand — comparing ‘Imran Khan the Barbarian’ with ‘Misbah Schumacher Haq’!
This signals that the generational change in Team India is yet to find its heroes in public domain. The Kohli chant in the stands is just about beginning to catch up, that despite the fact that he came into the middle one down and scored the first ever century by an Indian against Pakistan in the World Cup. From Sachin to Virat, it’s a long walk for adulators still, and at 22 centuries, Kohli is nowhere near the love quotient of the original master blaster Tendulkar. Dhoni is a star whose time is receding and Rohit Sharma is not even on the love meter as of now.
Meanwhile, in the stands, the Pakistani fans were outnumbered 30 to 70 by the Indians who had streamed in from not just all over Australia but also from India. But that did not stop them from getting together to make some noise - some huge amount of noise, the kind of noise Adelaide is not really accustomed to.
Much before the match started, the Pakistani flags were waving vigorously alongside the Tricolour outside the Adelaide Oval as local DJs Sunil and Charan played Bollywood numbers to set the mood. Having grown up on Bollywood, the Pakistanis did not mind gyrating to Indian music but when it came to the Chak De and Indiawalleh songs, few in green could keep up the cross border camaraderie. The greatest response came when the entire bandwagon gyrated noisily to “Punjabiyan di battery charged rehte hai, chaubis ghante” and the DJs kept getting repeat requests from Pakistanis, most of whom are here from the lahore and Sind.
That’s when the blue started gathering and the march across the river Torren attracted cameras and eyeballs with the Indians blowing the conch and beating the dhol in zaniest of desi costumes and colours. There was one dressed as a sadhu but with all the intentions of “drowning in beer once India starts winning, or losing for that matter.” The other refused to wear a shirt and only sported the Tricolour on his back. “Hindi superman,” he said, going at the vuvuzela to devastating effect!
The atmosphere was, indeed, amazing and the crescendo high despite the mercury soaring to a searing 39 degrees which failed to douse the enthusiasm of the spectators. Almost everyone had match tickets for the blockbuster clash later in the day. And those who didn’t, found people selling off the extras or just giving some away from free.
Around 5000 seats in the stadium were surprisingly empty, the reason being people not making it to Adelaide due to sold out flights, buses and trains. Many trooped in from Melbourne, driving through the night (close to 10 hours and then crashing into friends’ houses) but several of their other pals couldn’t make it. like Javed, who flew in from Sydney in the morning but missed out on his other friends from Melbourne who could join him at the airport due to air congestion.
Inside the stadium, it was a sea of blue with only two green tints in two small enclosures. The decibel was deafening, as if the match was being played in Kolkata and not Adelaide. Salman Khan couldn’t make it to Adelaide but Chulbul Pandey was very much there. “Respresnting Sallu bhai from my city Adelaide,” he said as the others blew the bugle for the battle which began at 2 pm sharp after Dhoni won the toss and decided to bat.