We have often heard of the fact that Test Cricket is gruelling for all the players involved and it requires a lot of dedication and hardwork from a player’s end to be successful in the superiormost and traditional form of cricket but have you ever wondered that Test Cricket can even be gruelling to a very good extent for the spectators present in the stadium and only the most dedicated fans of the game manage to watch an entire Test from the stands and despite all of that the ones who manage to do so return their homes with an unforgettable memory to cherish for a lifetime.
In this column, I will be bringing forward some of my real experiences which I encountered during the 2nd Test between India and England which happened at M.A. Chidambram Stadium (populary known as Chepauk Stadium) from 13th to 16th February 2021 in Chennai.
BUILD-UP
I am a 22 year old guy belonging to a middle class family from Prayagraj (formerly known as Allahabad) which is the land of the holy Sangam (meeting point of rivers Ganga, Yamuna & Saraswati) situated in the state of Uttar Pradesh. Back then, I was a final year B.Tech student from SRM Institute of Science & Technology, Kattankulathur situated on the outskirts of Chennai. Cricket Lovers would recognise our college with the feat that it has produced cricketers like Murali Vijay, Arun Karthik, Varun Chakravarthy, etc.
It was my last semester in progress in which a group of three were supposed to make a working model based on the things that they had learnt during the course of their degree. As our hardware model was a very complicated one, our guide wanted our group of three to come to the college by Mid-February and continue our project work under his able guidance so we planned to reach Chennai on 16 February for the sake of our project work.
At the same time, England were supposed to visit India for a tour of 4 Tests, 5 T20Is & 3 ODIs with the first two tests scheduled to be played in Chennai. The first test was played in the absence of any crowd where India were stunned by an incredible England as India were handed their first ever home test defeat in the past 4 years as England beat India by a whopping 227 runs. From hereon, India could not have afforded a single defeat in this series if they wished to play the WTC Final against New Zealand who had already qualified for the final.
COVID scare was a bit low in India in those days as the cases had declined significantly and many felt that the end of COVID might be near and in such a backdrop the Tamil Nadu government decided to allow a limited number of spectators for sporting events to be held in the state. The Tamil Nadu Cricket Association (TNCA) were overwhelmed upon hearing this order by the state government and immediately allowed for 50% of the stadium’s capacity to be filled with spectators.
The Test was scheduled from 13 February to 17 February and I decided to reschedule my plan to reach Chennai on 12 February as I intended watching the entire Test from the stadium. One other member of my project group who also happened to be a great cricket fanatic also decided to accompany me in this endeavour. I had been to stadium on some occassions in the past but unfortunately none of them were Test matches and the prospect of watching an entire Test excited me a lot.
Cricket Gear Repair Expert, R Bhaskaran stitching gloves outside Chepauk. I had a small chat with him while I was standing in the queue for redeeming the tickets. He is very a famous cricket gear repair expert and even players like Sachin Tendulkar and MS Dhoni have personally reached out to him for repairing some of their cricketing gears.
I was fortunate enough to grab hold of the match tickets for all the 5 days on 8 February for the both of us from the Paytm Insider app and it was a pure gamble as I still had to get Tatkal train tickets for my journey to Chennai else the match tickets would have been of no use to me. Fortunately, I got Tatkal ticket on 9 February for Ganga-Kaveri COVID-19 Special (Train No. 02670) which was scheduled to depart late in the night of 10th February. I boarded the train with three of my luggage items and reached Chennai on the afternoon of 12th February.
Queue at counters outside Chepauk for the physical redemption of online tickets
TNCA had asked all the spectators to redeem physical tickets at counters outside Chepauk for their online booking and though that could have been done on the morning of the match day itself, I decided to do it right away as I was well accustomed with the traditions of Chepauk owing to my past 4 years in Chennai. I knew that redeeming the tickets on the morning of the match day would mean that a good share of the morning session would be lost in redeeming the tickets itself. My place in Chennai was approximately 55 kms away from the stadium and I knew that I won’t be able to go to my place and come back the same day to redeem the tickets so I decided to go to the stadium straightaway from the railway station (on the back of a 2000 km train journey) which happened to be very close to the stadium. I stood in the queue for 7 hours in Chennai’s scorching Sun with all my luggage to redeem the physical tickets and reached my place by 10pm in the night after redeeming the tickets. My friend, who also happened to be my flatmate, was from Delhi. He was a tall and heavily built Sikh named Jaskirat Singh Sethi who arrived in the flat 30 minutes later as his train was supposed to reach in the night.
Physical tickets for all the 5 days
JOURNEY TO STADIUM
During the course of the test, we used to wake up at 4:30am and after doing all the morning chores we used to leave for the stadium by 5:45am. Our place was 55kms away from the stadium so it used to take us almost 2 and a half hours to reach the stadium. We had to walk to the nearest local train station named ‘Potheri’. The train from ‘Potheri’ used to drop us at the station ‘Chennai Fort’. We had to catch another train from ‘Chennai Fort’ to ‘Chepauk’ station on whose either sides are the famous Marina Beach and our destination Chepauk Stadium. We used to reach stadium by 8:15am and it used to take us another 30 minutes to stand in queue and enter the stadium. The play used to start at 9:30am and the 45 leftover minutes used to be our buffer in case the train gets delayed or something else happens.
Due to COVID restrictions, normal passengers were not allowed to travel using local train during the time of 4:30pm-7pm due to which we used to depart at 7pm despite the day’s play ending at 5pm. We used to reach ‘Potheri’ by 9pm and after having our dinner(which used to be the only meal of our day) at a local diner, we used to reach our place by 10pm. From thereon, we used to sleep like a log till 4:30am and again the cycle would repeat.
DAY 1
We were supposed to sit in K-Lower stand for this day but since I,J,K-Lower had access to each other’s seats, we decided to sit on J-Lower due to better quality of view from that stand. Virat Kohli won the toss and straightaway slotted his men to bat on a track which was expected to deteriorate as the game went on. Axar Patel was handed his Test debut. We were filled with a lot of enthusiasm and enjoyed the first session a lot despite the Sun disturbing us in bits and pieces. The afternoon session turned out to be an even bigger challenge in the scorching Chennai Sun for two guys who belonged to the Northern part of India. Mind you, be it January or June, the Chennai Sun is sufficient to make one feel uneasy throughout the course of the year due to the hot and humid climate of the coastal city. I could see that my friend was even more red than a Tomato could ever have been. Despite all this, we didn’t move from our place and go into the shade which was full of people by now as we didn’t find the view very pleasing to our eyes from the area under the shade while the view from our seat was as perfect as it could get. Nevertheless, all the heat was worth it for us as Rohit Sharma made the Englishmen feel the heat even more by his 161 runs which remained the highlight of the day and set up the tone for the Indian side in this test. Ajinkya Rahane also contributed well with his 67 runs as India ended with 300-6 at the end of day’s play.
A good thing for me personally was that I was sitting exactly behind Rohit’s shoulders and whenever Rohit was shown from the off-side by the broadcasters, I could be seen in the background.
Me (in Dark Grey) & My Friend (in Blue) / Courtesy: Screengrab From Hotstar
DAY 2
On the morning of Day 2, India bundled out pretty quickly for 329 runs on the board with Rishabh Pant entertaining the crowd with his unbeaten 58. English batsmen failed to find their groove on a track turning square and bundled out for a paltry 134 with nobody except Ben Foakes (42*) getting some rhythm. Local boy, Ravichandran Ashwin got a fifer which made the crowd really happy. India had to bat again for a good period of the last session and were at 54 for 1 when stumps happened.
This time around we were seated in H-Lower which was an even better stand in terms of view. The best part about this stand was that all the English and the Indian cricketers were passing at inches from us while going out to the nets to practice.
This time around due to the angles of the stadium’s terrace, the morning session was the most difficult one with the Sun trying to bog the spectators down and it appeared as if the Sun had some personal enmity against us.
Wriddhiman Saha raising his bat to the crowd chanting for him while walking out to practice in the nets
DAY 3
India had to bat well today to set up a pretty safe target against England to level the series at 1-1. At one stage, it looked like England might be in with an outside chance when they had reduced India to 106-6 but Virat Kohli’s 62 and Ravichandran Ashwin’s memorable 106 on a pitch which actually had demons in it, made India extremely safe as they made 286 before getting bowled out. England came out to bat and were found reeling at 53 for 3 at stumps.
We were again seated in H-Lower and enjoyed the same merits and demerits as the previous day. The afternoon session though wrecked havoc on me as my nose started to bleed and it was a cold but highly overpriced glass of Pepsi worth 80rs that made me feel better.
Me struggling with my bleeding nose as Ravichandran Ashwin races to a memorable-to-be century / Courtesy: Screengrab From Hotstar
DAY 4
In all likelihood, this was going to be the final day of the test considering England’s situation and the nature of the play so far. This fact made us happy as well as a bit sad at the same moment as we were very happy that India were on the brink of a victory but at the same time in some corner of our heart, we also felt that it would have been good had we got to witness some play on Day 5 as well.
The thought of the Test going to Day 5 looked realistic when England had batted 2/3rd of the morning session for the loss of a solitary wicket but it wasn’t meant to happen as England lost three wickets till lunch in quick succession from hereon. Moeen Ali tried to entertain the crowd but was the last man to be dismissed as England bundled out for 164 and lost by a massive margin of 317 runs. Axar Patel grabbed a fifer which was a very special feat for a man on his Test debut. Moeen possibly made a case for the IPL Auctions which was just 2 days away and in hindsight, one can say that Moeen’s 8 wickets in this test along with a knock of 43(18) on 16 February at Chepauk helped Moeen’s IPL case 2 days later as he was picked for 7 Crore by the very same franchise whose home ground is Chepauk, i.e., Chennai Super Kings.
We were seated in D-Lower as we saw India’s victory moment as MS Dhoni’s superfan Saravanan waved the flat right next to us. The crowd were ecstatic to see the local lad, Ravichandran Ashwin getting the Man of the Match Award for his contributions of 8 wickets and 119 runs in this Test.
It was expected that due to the terrace’s angles, the Sun would wreck havoc on this stand in the evening session but since that session didn’t happen due to the English side getting bowled out, we were saved from the wrath of the Sun god on this day.
Front: Me
Back: MS Dhoni Super Fan Saravanan waving the tricolour after Indian victory as other fans enjoy the post-match presentation ceremony.
EPILOGUE
Despite the challenges that we faced during the course of this Test, it will go down as one of the sweetest memory of my life. Even now on many occassions, when I close my eyes the scenic view of Chepauk Stadium with all those memories of players practising in front of me and Moeen Ali running to catch Rohit Sharma at 161 right in front of our stand with me praying real hard to almost all of the Gods of the Universe to make him drop that catch, flash right in front of my eyes.
If you are a diehard Cricket fan, I would highly recommend you to watch atleast one complete Test match inside a stadium in the course of your life as it would give you many memories to cherish for your life.
NOTABLE MENTION
A notable mention to the problem of drinking water must be quoted in this blog as I really wish this article reaches the concerned authorities and they work on it. We had to face a lot of issues due to this and we really hope that spectators don’t have to face any such issue in any stadium in the world in the future.
Chepauk doesn’t allow anyone to bring in water from the outside while inside the premises of the stadium, free water is available very rarely that too only in a limited number of stands which makes the spectators buy paid water which costs 10rs for a very small cup of glass which is not at all sufficient to pacify anyone’s thirst. People drink a lot of water in Chennai as it is a really hot place and spending 150rs (which would be the price if you drink a modest amount of water during the course of a day’s play) for water in a single day isn’t an ideal scenario by any means for spectators entering into a stadium by shelling out 100rs for the cheapest per day variant of the ticket and the most expensive ones being slated at 200rs per day. This usually makes the spectators go thirsty for long periods of time or the spectators end up shelling out more on water than what they spent on the ticket itself.
After Indian Victory
Left: Me (Rahul Chaubey)
Right: My Friend (Jaskirat Singh Sethi)
