Monday, September 24, 2007

Cricket: sixes and wickets [huzzah for India!]

When I started telling friends that I was about to move to India, several said that I would be duty-bound to learn something about cricket in order to engage in polite conversation about India’s national sport. I replied that I would resist the temptation to throw good time after the project of understanding this silly sport.
Well, I have not resisted strongly enough: I actually am figuring out the game and its appeal as a spectator sport. This is made simple by several recent exciting and important tournaments, one of which is just beginning as I write this. India lost a heart-breaking best-of-seven series to England, and then came back to beat England in a “twenty-twenty” series, which concludes tonight in a match between India and Pakistan.
The local hero is a batter called Yuvraj Singh, who has delivered a record-breaking flurry of the equivalent of home runs (called “sixes”) in the last few matches. So in paying a bit of attention to this spectacle, I have been absorbing other aspects of the game through listening to commentary and asking naïve questions.
One of the appeals of cricket as a spectator sport is that a LOT of runs are scored: sometimes over two hundred per side. So instead of waiting hours for a single run, there is action a-plenty: the scoreboard is always cranking! Actually I started developing a wee bit of understanding of the game while watching the GREAT Bollywood film “Lagaan” which featured a crucial cricket match between British Imperial functionaries and a team of Indian peasants, who had to learn the game before they could play (and defeat) the Brits.
But I digress. The excitement here is sparkling: the community is gathered in the recreation room watching the Big Game on a bigscreen TV. There were rollicking cheers when India were at bat and scoring runs. They didn’t get a particularly high score, only 157; and Yuvraj was a great disappointment. Now Pakistan are batting. (Note the britishism adopted here as collective nouns like team names are conjugated as plurals). It is now all about tension and waiting. The only sounds of celebration are related to stunning defensive plays, which are rare. Pakistan are playing fairly conservatively instead of trying to blast sixes into the stands, which risks a wicket. A number of fine bowlers have put nine wickets together: one more and Pakistan are out on wickets! Now we are at endgame, and a Pakistani batter named Misbah has just hit four sixes and got his team back in the game at 152 runs, but the nine wickets might be a problem. Then at the very next pitch following a mighty smashing six, he pops up a weak fluttering ball which is caught, and so INDIA HAVE WON!!! The fireworks are all around and there is frenzied dancing in the clubhouse, as there will be all over the SubContinent.
So even though I do not yet grok the subtleties of this strange sport, I have shared an exciting few hours drinking from the cup of nationalism and spectator sports: a heady brew! This game will be the subject of jolly conversation for the next week or more, so I am glad to have seen a lot of it, and gladder still that I can actually follow some of the conversation. When in doubt about details of the win related in profoundly technical cricket-talk, I plan to huzzah that India won even with a dull performance from Yuvraj: what glory would have been if he would have been on his game! What a team to win even without help from their star batter! Huzzah for India!

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