The BCCI President, Anurag Thakur, is mesmerised by the response of the Indore crowd to first ever Test match played in the city. People are coming in large numbers to watch their stars plays, not only this as 3 days back when both the teams landed in the city, they were received by a large number of fans at the airport and on their way to the team’s hotel. Fans were lined up roadside and the moment team’s reached there, the rainy night turned into DJ night as there were hundreds of flashes coming out from the cell phones of fans who just wanted to click a picture of their stars.
This critical reception from fans touched the New Zealand player Jimmy Neesham, he even expressed his gratitude on social media as well. Shane Jurgensen, the New Zealand bowling coach also highlighted this fact in the press conference.
BCCI President Anurag Thakur called this as a ‘good experiment’ and contemplated on taking Test cricket to smaller cities
“We have taken an initiative to take Test matches to small cities. The decision to hold the same in Indore proved right. In future also, we will take it to such cities,” Thakur told PTI.
Thakur also showered praises on MPCA for their efforts they have put to host their first ever Test match, “MPCA has done a wonderful job, we are thankful to the people of Indore for showing so much of enthusiasm for the test match between India and New Zealand,” he said.
Thakur himself marked his presence at the first day’s play between India and New Zealand. He also went on the ground to inspect the atmosphere of the stadium and to see the craziness of fans towards the game and the players. The fans present on the ground were the main source of motivation for the players as they were cheering and motivating for team India on each and every ball. A critical reception on the last bowl of the day was a must-watch moment.
It seems like BCCI’s experiment to host a Test match at smaller a smaller city has worked as we have seen enough crowd on day 1 itself. Similar can be the scenes on Day 2 as well but the population might drop from day 3 onwards as Monday will be a working day, students and working people may be reluctant to take an off to watch the game. Still, one can expect a larger crowd from what we saw in Kanpur and Kolkata.