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Cricket & Crowd

© Ahmad Nawaz

A sport is just not a competition between two individuals or two teams, it is much more than that. It is for the entertainment of people, for the enhancement of sportsman spirit and for developing good relations. Crowd, viewers or the spectators are one of the most important factors for a game, doesn't matter whether it is cricket, soccer, tennis or any other sport.

Cricket is renowned to be a very gentle game being played by gentlemen, so the spectators are ought to be gentlemen. Unfortunately, it is not the case during some matches recently played particularly with Indian crowd being involved in them. India is a very big country and their team gets good support at home and even abroad in Sharjah, England, Australia... but sadly their crowd does not behave in a very good manner.

It was Asian Test Championship, in early 1999, Pakistan vs India at Calcutta. Tendulkar, the batsman who is worshipped by Indians was given run out because of no one's fault. The incident in short was that Tendulkar played the ball towards mid-wicket, he was coming back for the third run and was looking at the fielder, the fielder threw the ball but there was a collision between Shoaib Akhtar and Tendulkar at the pitch as Tendulkar was looking towards the fielder and Shoaib had his back towards Tendulkar. The throw from the fielder was a direct hit and Tendulkar bat was not planted in the crease and thus he was given run out. The Eden Gardens crowd's behavior was awful. They started throwing bottles at the Pakistani fielders and did not allow them to start the match. Eventually, Tendulkar had to take a round of the whole stadium to calm down the angry Eden Garden crowd. It is also worth mentioning that the series was being played under some serious tension.

Going a bit further back, World Cup 1996, India vs Sri Lanka, World Cup Semi-final and same ground - Eden Gardens, Calcutta. India was chasing a relatively hard target but their batting at once failed because of some brilliant bowling of Jaysuria (he also won the Man of the Tournament award in this World Cup). Calcutta crowd could not suffer that and not only started throwing bottles and other such things rather they burnt fire in the stadium. The match was abandoned and ICC Match Referee announced the Sri Lankan victory.

In World Cup 99, at England, the match between Pakistan & India at Lancashire Cricket Ground there was very tight security in order to avoid any unwanted incident as Pakistan and India were not only playing in the field but also in the stands. There was not any such irritating incident as India won the game. Special security measures were taken in the other games in which India was participating because of Indian crowd behavior.

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