Jail brigade
As fans' sartorial soirees go, this one took the cake, or was it the absconders from India? A pack of five businessmen from Gujarat are touring the India games in one and black stripe jail uniform and their jail numbers work in multiples. There is a "chaarsau bees" to lead the group and that kind of doubles up with the fun. "We thought it was appropriate to sport this as we want to send the message to the Nirav Modis and the Vijay Mallyas that we are here to get them back," said Rahil Patwa who otherwise runs an IT solutions company back home. Then there is a builder, a printing press owner and the like who got together to be here for at least three India matches - against South Africa, Australia and Pakistan. "We will be back if India reaches the Big Final," says Patwa, confident for now that 350 will be the Oval score that the Aussies will have to chase. "Unsuccessfully," he concludes with a smile before sauntering to the beer counter at the back.
Out of the glove
As Rohit-Dhawan started rolling out their shots after a cautious start, the Dhoni glove talk in the stands started snowballing into full-fledged patriotic fervour in the form of a whole lot of Bollywood singing to the beat of live drums brought in by the Bharat Army brigade. As the drummers did the round of the stands to the tune of "Is deshkidharti…", the bhangra and the beer got the frenzy the fifth gear with the sea of blue joining in the proceedings. One of the drummers was just 12 years old but that did not make his beats any callow. Patriotism flows into the stands whenever its Indian cricket and there's no rulebook to stop it.
600 a ticket
Talking of Bharat Army, they have been making a good cut in selling eleventh hour tickets for the sold out Oval show. "I made my enquiries and they told me that I would have to pay at least 600 pounds for one ticket. Since I needed two, it was quite steep for me," said Rahul C Ganti who is here on a short non-cricket holiday with his family from Texas. He finally bought them online a day before the match "though it cost me the same ultimately with all the service charges etc," he said, which means someone somewhere made a cool 1200 pounds. What was alarming was the fact that the fake tickets were in circulation as Ganti and his son Rohit discovered that two other patrons had the same ticket with the same seat numbers.
Story of need
As the sun shone bright over London, promising to make it a good day for cricket, ticketless fans of all ages stationed themselves at the Oval tube station, asking for spare ones from arriving janata. Carrying placards saying "spare tickets please" or " I need tickets" or mere verbal requests were being made from the exit door of the Oval tube station all the way to the main gates of the iconic cricket stadium. Indian students, old English gentlemen in cricket hats and khaki shorts and young women - all were there with their requests even as a hyper active cricket securityman kept warning against buying tickets from fans. "Do not buy tickets from anyone outside. Those who have tickets please go into the stadium immediately," he kept screaming even as the some fans gathered around official ticket windows despite the signage saying "sold out.