Scenes at F.C. Ground

Cricket is in the air these days in India (when it isn't one might ask?). All the cricketing enthusiasts are getting their errands hurriedly done so that they can uninterruptedly watch the India-Pakistan match in the evening today. I thought this would be an opportune time to share a mail on the same subject that I wrote to recount my experience of playing cricket with friends on the famed Ferguson College ground. I hope you enjoy reading it :).

30 September 2007

Since sometime now I have been playing cricket at F.C. ground with my friends. We convoke at the ground at around 7 on Saturday mornings. The ground is teeming with activities - people of all ages exercising, cricket teams of varying team sizes with varying paraphernalia playing, F.C. ground staff rolling the patch of ground that has semblance of a pitch etc. However, these activities themselves were not the ones which drew my attention. Unfailingy at around 7:15 AM a distant loudspeaker somewhere in the college campus heralds the beginning of day by first playing few second-long shehnai-based classical music piece which is immediately followed by our national anthem. As soon as the national anthem begins the whole F.C. ground freezes as far as you can see. The joggers, the young boys cricket brigades - *everyone*. They literally stop whatever they were doing and pay reverence to the national anthem. After the national anthem concludes it is as if someone pressed the play button to resume the hustle bustle where it left from. It was such a heartwarming scene!

The cricket matches themselves are pretty amusing. At any given time there could be six to seven matches going on on the same ground. It is enough to make any ICC official's jaw drop. The boundaries of each "groundlet" overlap. The pitches themselves are haphazardly placed. It goes without saying that it isn't uncommon to find fielder of match A at mid-on just a few pace away from a third-man fielder of match B. In fact during one match while fielding at mid-wicket position I almost ran into the batsman of match B at striker end who was just about to swoosh the ball wildy towards *his* mid-on. I was saved from a jaw-dropping incident - literally. Seeing the IT folk riding of the outsourcing wave, these cricketing teams have mastered outsourcing too. The fielding beyond certain circumference is duly outsourced to the adjacent team. So when you find a pinch hitter hitting the ball off the park (park = groundlet) you will invariably find the fielders from that match A screaming "Eh ball! ball!" signalling the fielders of match B to collect the outsourced fielding assignment. Fielders from match B do that diligently often juggling with their ongoing fielding chore. And we have mergers and acquisitions too. When a few slackers from some match don't make it to the ground they find the most appealling team and make them an offer for alliance.

We usually play till 9 AM or so and then the event culminates with a customary trip to Vaishali or some other F.C. road eatery for piping hot idli sambhar and filter coffee.