Monday, November 16, 2009

Cricket Sort of Person

Of course the Indian Premiere League happens to be the liveliest shindig to have ever happened to the gallant sport. And it has done more for it than perhaps has been done in recent years. The tragedy of it all, however, (and there is a tragedy to everything), is what the IPL has undone for cricket.

I'm a cricket sort of person. I mean, I respect and tolerate other games of the wheeled, racqueted and  goaled varieties, but the sort of person I am, is cricket. What it was before we made it this.

I remember, like all old souls do of their past, the days of yore. Something about the memory of cricket then was different. Watching India play a test match the other day felt surreal. The leisure of it all - the sinfully laborious five days of slow and quick sport became a part of life, and of the character of cricket. It was not a break you took from a recession-pressed world for three hours, or a tailor made fantasy league fiesta. It was cricket with all its old school paraphernalia. 

Commentary was lethargic, tea breaks and lunch breaks paused matches; God, was in the detail. It was a different time philosophically.

The whack of the willow followed by mad shrieks from the wicket microphones sound in so many of the finest, not just of my memories, but those of the nation. Cricket, epitome of a colonial hangover, commercialized, criticized, politicized, remains in our hearts the most magical of all sports.

Because a one-day international feels (felt?) like a weekend, even on a Tuesday. The perfect excuse to set aside an entire day; stall all duties and anxieties arising therein. Work feels like Friday when nothing occupies minds and discourse but the batting order of the home team. 

The problem with shorter sports is precisely this. The brevity of it all. You could argue otherwise and say today's hurried age will allow only for these. But the thing cricket represents is the kind of leisure we're trying to hold on to. The leisure to be able to spend an entire day watching a game, sans guilt, without it being considered sacrilege.

Television screens take us into wide meadows, surrounded by many tiers of partying, covered by azure, balmy skies. Coins twirl, captains call, kookaburras swing, flags flutter, lungs tire.

So many of us cricket sort of people have childhood memories of abandoned streets greeting a morning of an India-Pakistan duel. The third umpire’s pending decisions, while players gather around constitute some of the most anxious moments of our lives. We let dinners freeze on tables while the venerable Duckworth and Lewis decide what is to be done with a washed out game. The Australian cricket team gives us more nightmares than the Board exams ever did.

Snooty and prim, local and colloquial, colourful and loud, well mannered and heartbreaking, funny and tragic, cricket is everything.

Lately, many bad things have been said about our obsession with the sport, and worse things written. I thought it was about time something was said about the magic of a game which has withstood the vagaries of fickle opinion, vested interest, and allegations of decadence.

Every time cricket season comes, you feel the silly points in your bones. Because some times things are just magical. Beyond mundane debate. Magic is not about moving with the times. Magic is made of feeling and imagery and memory. And magic is cricket.

Did I mention I’m a cricket sort of person? 

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