Wankhede Crowd is testament to what test cricket in India could look like

[zep1706]

It was an absolute delight to see such good crowd for test cricket in India. Wankhede should be made a traditional home test cricket in India, like Lord's or MCG. It should get one test every year and Mohali should be cut out. 

[kosingh]

Great crowd. But do I miss the crowds from the 90 and early 2000s. Looking at videos of Aus and Pak in India ...insane crowds in tests. Golden time to be a cricket fan weee the 90s.

[maniac]

Fantastic crowd.....Also Kohli's team is going to save Test match cricket in India....with the advent of IPL,people were slowly losing enthusiasm for tests and hell even ODI's.....so lot of credit to his team too.

[G_B_]

46 minutes ago, kosingh said:

Great crowd. But do I miss the crowds from the 90 and early 2000s. Looking at videos of Aus and Pak in India ...insane crowds in tests. Golden time to be a cricket fan weee the 90s.

to be fair if Pak v India happens the crowds will come....

[G_B_]

and Wankhede, I remember in 2009 v SL or somebody there was literally nobody in the stadium. The Sachin goodbye was well attended.  The last game v England which India lost was ok as well. More than the stadium its Kohli and his sexy brand of cricket attracting people to the stadiums.

 

We have always had good turnout at Chennai Hyderbad and Bangalore. Eden has dropped off. Vizag seems like another stadium which IMO can become a good healthy test match center. 

 

India needs to develop 8-9 grounds which can provide a minimum of 10-15k a day for the first 3 days atleast.

[Laaloo]

4 minutes ago, G_B_ said:

and Wankhede, I remember in 2009 v SL or somebody there was literally nobody in the stadium. The Sachin goodbye was well attended.  The last game v England which India lost was ok as well. More than the stadium its Kohli and his sexy brand of cricket attracting people to the stadiums.

 

We have always had good turnout at Chennai Hyderbad and Bangalore. Eden has dropped off. Vizag seems like another stadium which IMO can become a good healthy test match center. 

 

India needs to develop 8-9 grounds which can provide a minimum of 10-15k a day for the first 3 days atleast.

Vizag and Indore are your best bet. Take mohali and rajkot out please.

 

Indore stadium is located right in the middle of the city. It was well attended for all 5 days against NZ. Vizag as well although most of them were kids.

[G_B_]

I have no issue with kids attending. Thats a good thing. If Vizag can continue to bring the kids in, should be seen as a positive. Hooking them young to test cricket is a investment.

 

Bums on seats should be welcome IMO. If anything I would say any test cricket ground if they want to host must have 25% of the ground given to children (boys and girls) for free. This includes water and a decent meal. 

 

 

[sandeep]

I think this year BCCI had explicitly experimented with giving priority to new and "2nd tier" test venues.  Hopefully they will strike the right balance between taking test cricket to more venues, as well as having marquee games against top opponents in more crowd-filled venues, as well as keeping in mind the home advantage requirements.    

 

 

[Vijy]

18 minutes ago, sandeep said:

I think this year BCCI had explicitly experimented with giving priority to new and "2nd tier" test venues.  Hopefully they will strike the right balance between taking test cricket to more venues, as well as having marquee games against top opponents in more crowd-filled venues, as well as keeping in mind the home advantage requirements.    

 

 

That would be a good balance.

[Cricketics]

I hope they can move the last Chennai test to Delhi. That's the best place to move to at short notice. Kotla will bring some decent crowd at last minute. 

[Lannister]

8 hours ago, Cricketics said:

I hope they can move the last Chennai test to Delhi. That's the best place to move to at short notice. Kotla will bring some decent crowd at last minute. 

No more Test matches in Delhi. The smog covering makes it a dross feel for TV viewers. Dharmshala had a good turnout and should be encouraged. I would've preferred B'lore, but the weather at this time of a year is not one to play Cricket. 

[BeautifulGame]

I hope they can move the last Chennai test to Delhi. That's the best place to move to at short notice. Kotla will bring some decent crowd at last minute. 

If you are moving a test match from Chennai at short notice ,the best option is to move it to Bangalore.Its the nearest place .Not sure how moving to Delhi the best place or option.

Either way weather has improved so there seems no reason to move from Chennai in the first place

[Dinx - the Jinx]

On 12/12/2016 at 10:53 AM, Cricketics said:

First up, my hats off  to the crowd who came in big numbers all day and on top made lot of noise and made the game look more watchable on TV.

 

I honestly feel places like Wankhede deserve a major test match every year. This is our Fenway Park, this is our MCG, and this is our Lord's. We have to treat it like it. I know we have plenty of grounds, but Test Cricket needs to be treated the way it deserves treatment, which is a special treatment. There are only about 3-5 home test played regularly in a year for India or at times 7, and one of them for me has to be Wankhede every time.

 

Players love such atmosphere and if we need to make sure that people at other locations in India show up to the stadiums for a test match, then they need to have a game at Wankhede every year so people can watch on tv and see how interested people are in watching test cricket in person.

 

Day 4 deserves a special mention. We were 7 down, and 1 quick wicket would have resulted in early closure of our innings. People do not like spending money when India is bowling, and this was a big risk yesterday as India could have been easily bowled out in first half an hour or 1st hour and rest of the day crowd would have had to settle with just Indian bowling. However, Right form the first ball, the stadium was making noise. The crowd showed up in big numbers to watch Kohli's 200 and Jayant too contributed extremely well and made his first century. More than the whole of India, I think Wankhede crowd who turned up in big numbers deserved to see Indian batting for a longer period which they eventually got to see on Day 4, deservingly.

 

To conclude, we seriously need to put more games at this ground. It might not be our fortress in test cricket, but there is too much history involved with this ground. It is a sacred place for a cricket fan, every Indian should visit it on a pilgrimage.

 

Let's bring back the crowds to test matches.

 

First of all - thank you Cricketics for creating a thread on this topic. This is something that I wanted to discuss for a long time now. Wanted to open a thread myself, but since you have opened one already, I'll post my view points here.

Before that I would like to also establish my credibility here to post on this topic of stadiums and crowds. I have been going to stadiums since 1987 (my father took me to watch a Worldcup match, which was the start) and I started going on my own with friends since 1994. I have been to more than 20 Test matches (when I go see a test match, I dont just go on the Sat/Sun, instead I purchase a season ticket and go all 5 days). I have watched test matches in Chennai, Bangalore, Lords (yes, England) and more recently the Mumbai test that concluded yesterday.

With this background, I think I have earned my rights to comment on this topic.

Firstly, Cricketics and many of the people who have posted on this thread - have not really gone to stadiums and experienced the atmosphere and are making their comments mostly based on what they show on TV. What they show on TV can be skewed. To give you an example, Wankhade's capacity is 35-40K. On Saturday the attendance was 19400, yet we may think that the stadium is full and jam packed, because TV cameras generally zoom in on crowded sections (or wherever a tv camera zooms in, crowd will get there to make it look even crowded).

So, what I am saying is doing just go by whats shown on TV. Refrain from making a strong point without experiencing it first hand.

Mumbai crowd is noisy definitely, among all the crowds that I have experienced. They have a lot of energy and they keep shouting slogans which is great. Bangalore and Chennai crowd lacks in this area. They make more noise when there is fall of wicket or boundary balls. Other times, they simply make noise with the plastic bottles and whistles. They are not good at slogan chanting and singing. Even if they do, it will be in Tamil/Kannada which wont make any sense to players anyways. However, based on my experience, Chennai crowds are larger in numbers and decently noisier. Also Chennai attracts consistent crowds across Day 1, 2, 3 and 4 and not spike only on weekends. Day 5 crowd depends on how much is left on that day. In Bangalore and Mumbai - they get good crowds only on weekends. Thu, Fri and Mon, Tue are usually not very crowded. But you really cant make it out on TV. You need to experience it by standing in the long queues, getting into the stands, get crushed in the seats. Thats when you'll realise whether its good crowd or big crowd. 

The reason I feel Chennai is able to attract consistently large crowds, they give out less complimentary passes and sell majority of tickets to public. In Bangalore and Mumbai, the guys who get free complimentary passes dont turn up at the stadiums if India is bowling. They turn up only when we are batting. A Chennaite who bought ticket by paying money, will turn up irrespective of whether we are batting or bowling. 

Also, I dont agree with the OP in saying, "People do not like spending money when India is bowling, and this was a big risk yesterday as India could have been easily bowled out in first half an hour or 1st hour and rest of the day crowd would have had to settle with just Indian bowling" 

In my opinion, we need to go and watch irrespective of whether we are batting or bowling. Our team needs crowd support more while bowling than while batting. This puts opposition batsmen under lot of pressure. In fact, I enjoy watching our bowling in the stadium where as a member of the crowd you can get behind every delivery and appeal for every good ball and celebrate more. Batting is more enjoyable on TV where you can dissect the beauty of the shot on many angles.

Also the OP praising Mumbai crowd for coming on Day 4, with India having only 3 wickets left is not well appreciated. As I said, if you are true fan, you'll watch anything that your team is involved in - even when they are practicing in nets (when I was a fan boy, I used to goto staduim one day before the tests just to watch our players doing nets). The Day 4 happened to be a Sunday and hence the crowd. So dont give credit where it is not due. Day 1 and Day 2 hardly had any crowd. I was able to stretch myself across 3 seats :)

Regarding Dharu - there is no stadium in India where alcohol is allowed. Not even in corporate or VIP boxes. I have been to a few of them and I can tell confidently about this. Absolutely no alcohol anywhere in India. Forget alcohol. Not even smoking is easy these days.

Whereas in England, where I watched the Ind Vs Eng in 2014, the only test that we wont in that series, there is a free flow of beers. There are beer gardens setup on all corners of the stadium where people create a picnic atmosphere. It appeared to me like many people came only drink and have a good time. Cricket was only an excuse.

Now regarding which venues should get matches every year or more often - I think BCCI has to create two buckets (a) Traditional venues and (b) New venues

Under Traditional bucket I'll place - Kolkatta, Mumbai, Chennai, Delhi and Bangalore. All these venues have stadiums in city centers (although these cities have become quite big these days that if you are in suburbs like North Bombay or South Madras, it will be a long commute to get to the stadium, which are in the central part of the original city) and the crowds are knowledgeable, noisy and come in consistently. If we can establish things like our own Boxing day test, New Year test etc, it would be fantastic. My father told me that in the 80s there was a tradition that Chennai used to get a test match every year in January that coincided with the Pongal festival which had 3 public holidays in a row, which when combined with Sat/Sun will ensure there is huge crowds every day of the test. Similar festive days can be established for Mumbai, Kolkatta and play test matches on those days.

Although Mohali has been hosting tests since 1994, I would not put them in the traditional bucket. They are still an evolving test match crowd and they havent become matured enough to understand the nuances of test cricket and hence the lack of interest in coming to test matches. Last year, I was working in Gurgaon and was visiting Chandigarh and Kasauli. I wanted to see the Mohali stadium atleast from outside, as there was no match at that time. This stadium is very beautifully located, no hassles in getting to the stadium and there is no excuse for people to not come. The only thing I can think of is it lacks a roof except in the grand stand, which can be quite a pain to sit through whole day under the sun.

Under the new bucket - I'll put all the other test venues that cropped up after the above 5 in the traditional bucket. Ahmedabad, Kanpur, Nagpur, Mohali, Hyderabad, and the new boys on the block - Indore, Rajkot, Vizag, Pune, Ranchi, Dharamsala - they should get matches in turns after the traditional venues were allocated first. This means that these venues will get one test once in 2-3 years, but thats ok.  

Also, I dont like the concept of having multiple stadiums in same state. For Eg: Maharashtra alone has 4 stadiums - Wankhade and Brabourne in Mumbai, Pune, Nagpur. Now Gujarat has Rajkot and Ahmedabad. Andhra has Hyderabad and Vizag, Whereas Tamil Nadu has only one in Chennai, Karnataka has only one in Bangalore. So anyone who cares to goto Test matches in these states will go to their respective stadiums in the state capital. Whereas a fan in Pune will not goto Mumbai instead will wait for Pune to get the match. This basically scatters the crowds.

 

 

[Forever Indian]

1 hour ago, Dinx - the Jinx said:

First of all - thank you Cricketics for creating a thread on this topic. This is something that I wanted to discuss for a long time now. Wanted to open a thread myself, but since you have opened one already, I'll post my view points here.

Before that I would like to also establish my credibility here to post on this topic of stadiums and crowds. I have been going to stadiums since 1987 (my father took me to watch a Worldcup match, which was the start) and I started going on my own with friends since 1994. I have been to more than 20 Test matches (when I go see a test match, I dont just go on the Sat/Sun, instead I purchase a season ticket and go all 5 days). I have watched test matches in Chennai, Bangalore, Lords (yes, England) and more recently the Mumbai test that concluded yesterday.

With this background, I think I have earned my rights to comment on this topic.

Firstly, Cricketics and many of the people who have posted on this thread - have not really gone to stadiums and experienced the atmosphere and are making their comments mostly based on what they show on TV. What they show on TV can be skewed. To give you an example, Wankhade's capacity is 35-40K. On Saturday the attendance was 19400, yet we may think that the stadium is full and jam packed, because TV cameras generally zoom in on crowded sections (or wherever a tv camera zooms in, crowd will get there to make it look even crowded).

So, what I am saying is doing just go by whats shown on TV. Refrain from making a strong point without experiencing it first hand.

Mumbai crowd is noisy definitely, among all the crowds that I have experienced. They have a lot of energy and they keep shouting slogans which is great. Bangalore and Chennai crowd lacks in this area. They make more noise when there is fall of wicket or boundary balls. Other times, they simply make noise with the plastic bottles and whistles. They are not good at slogan chanting and singing. Even if they do, it will be in Tamil/Kannada which wont make any sense to players anyways. However, based on my experience, Chennai crowds are larger in numbers and decently noisier. Also Chennai attracts consistent crowds across Day 1, 2, 3 and 4 and not spike only on weekends. Day 5 crowd depends on how much is left on that day. In Bangalore and Mumbai - they get good crowds only on weekends. Thu, Fri and Mon, Tue are usually not very crowded. But you really cant make it out on TV. You need to experience it by standing in the long queues, getting into the stands, get crushed in the seats. Thats when you'll realise whether its good crowd or big crowd. 

The reason I feel Chennai is able to attract consistently large crowds, they give out less complimentary passes and sell majority of tickets to public. In Bangalore and Mumbai, the guys who get free complimentary passes dont turn up at the stadiums if India is bowling. They turn up only when we are batting. A Chennaite who bought ticket by paying money, will turn up irrespective of whether we are batting or bowling. 

Also, I dont agree with the OP in saying, "People do not like spending money when India is bowling, and this was a big risk yesterday as India could have been easily bowled out in first half an hour or 1st hour and rest of the day crowd would have had to settle with just Indian bowling" 

In my opinion, we need to go and watch irrespective of whether we are batting or bowling. Our team needs crowd support more while bowling than while batting. This puts opposition batsmen under lot of pressure. In fact, I enjoy watching our bowling in the stadium where as a member of the crowd you can get behind every delivery and appeal for every good ball and celebrate more. Batting is more enjoyable on TV where you can dissect the beauty of the shot on many angles.

Also the OP praising Mumbai crowd for coming on Day 4, with India having only 3 wickets left is not well appreciated. As I said, if you are true fan, you'll watch anything that your team is involved in - even when they are practicing in nets (when I was a fan boy, I used to goto staduim one day before the tests just to watch our players doing nets). The Day 4 happened to be a Sunday and hence the crowd. So dont give credit where it is not due. Day 1 and Day 2 hardly had any crowd. I was able to stretch myself across 3 seats :)

Regarding Dharu - there is no stadium in India where alcohol is allowed. Not even in corporate or VIP boxes. I have been to a few of them and I can tell confidently about this. Absolutely no alcohol anywhere in India. Forget alcohol. Not even smoking is easy these days.

Whereas in England, where I watched the Ind Vs Eng in 2014, the only test that we wont in that series, there is a free flow of beers. There are beer gardens setup on all corners of the stadium where people create a picnic atmosphere. It appeared to me like many people came only drink and have a good time. Cricket was only an excuse.

Now regarding which venues should get matches every year or more often - I think BCCI has to create two buckets (a) Traditional venues and (b) New venues

Under Traditional bucket I'll place - Kolkatta, Mumbai, Chennai, Delhi and Bangalore. All these venues have stadiums in city centers (although these cities have become quite big these days that if you are in suburbs like North Bombay or South Madras, it will be a long commute to get to the stadium, which are in the central part of the original city) and the crowds are knowledgeable, noisy and come in consistently. If we can establish things like our own Boxing day test, New Year test etc, it would be fantastic. My father told me that in the 80s there was a tradition that Chennai used to get a test match every year in January that coincided with the Pongal festival which had 3 public holidays in a row, which when combined with Sat/Sun will ensure there is huge crowds every day of the test. Similar festive days can be established for Mumbai, Kolkatta and play test matches on those days.

Although Mohali has been hosting tests since 1994, I would not put them in the traditional bucket. They are still an evolving test match crowd and they havent become matured enough to understand the nuances of test cricket and hence the lack of interest in coming to test matches. Last year, I was working in Gurgaon and was visiting Chandigarh and Kasauli. I wanted to see the Mohali stadium atleast from outside, as there was no match at that time. This stadium is very beautifully located, no hassles in getting to the stadium and there is no excuse for people to not come. The only thing I can think of is it lacks a roof except in the grand stand, which can be quite a pain to sit through whole day under the sun.

Under the new bucket - I'll put all the other test venues that cropped up after the above 5 in the traditional bucket. Ahmedabad, Kanpur, Nagpur, Mohali, Hyderabad, and the new boys on the block - Indore, Rajkot, Vizag, Pune, Ranchi, Dharamsala - they should get matches in turns after the traditional venues were allocated first. This means that these venues will get one test once in 2-3 years, but thats ok.  

Also, I dont like the concept of having multiple stadiums in same state. For Eg: Maharashtra alone has 4 stadiums - Wankhade and Brabourne in Mumbai, Pune, Nagpur. Now Gujarat has Rajkot and Ahmedabad. Andhra has Hyderabad and Vizag, Whereas Tamil Nadu has only one in Chennai, Karnataka has only one in Bangalore. So anyone who cares to goto Test matches in these states will go to their respective stadiums in the state capital. Whereas a fan in Pune will not goto Mumbai instead will wait for Pune to get the match. This basically scatters the crowds.

 

 

Some good points there especially regarding spread of crowd due to having many stadiums concentrated in a state. 

 

I also feel that Chennai has one of the best crowds for test matches. It is a shame that due to a dispute there are 3 stands which have been closed, hope it gets sorted soon.

[kosingh]

Where, when and how did Eden Gardens lose its number 1 spot. 

Edited December 13, 2016 by kosingh

[Dinx - the Jinx]

51 minutes ago, kosingh said:

Where, when and how did Eden Gardens lose its number 1 spot. 

In my opinion Eden Gardens is still the Mecca of cricket in India. Dont tale the OPs claim seriously that Mumbai has suddenly become the MCG or Fenway park.

 

PS: I am not from Kolkatta. I am from Chennai and living in Bangalore these days

[Forever Indian]

With respect to Wankhede, it is very funny that my brother went to buy tickets at the ground early on Day 1 and returned back as all tickets were reportedly sold out. Reality though was that the stadium was atleast 30% empty, so it seems giving away all these complimentary passes is also contributing massively to less crowd turnout. 

[Cricketics]

2 hours ago, Dinx - the Jinx said:

Firstly, Cricketics and many of the who have posted on this thread - have not really gone to stadiums and experienced the atmosphere and are making their comments mostly based on what they show on TV. What they show on TV can be skewed. To give you an example, Wankhade's capacity is 35-40K. On Saturday the attendance was 19400, yet we may think that the stadium is full and jam packed, because TV cameras generally zoom in on crowded sections (or wherever a tv camera zooms in, crowd will get there to make it look even crowded).

So, what I am saying is doing just go by whats shown on TV. Refrain from making a strong point without experiencing it first hand.

Mumbai crowd is noisy definitely, among all the crowds that I have experienced. They have a lot of energy and they keep shouting slogans which is great. Bangalore and Chennai crowd lacks 

Also, I dont agree with the OP in saying, "People do not like spending money when India is bowling, and this was a big risk yesterday as India could have been easily bowled out in first half an hour or 1st hour and rest of the day crowd would have had to settle with just Indian bowling" 

In my opinion, we need to go and watch irrespective of whether we are batting or bowling. Our team needs crowd support more while bowling than while batting. This puts opposition batsmen under lot of pressure. In fact, I enjoy watching our bowling in the stadium where as a member of the crowd you can get behind every delivery and appeal for every good ball and celebrate more. Batting is more enjoyable on TV where you can dissect the beauty of the shot

Also the OP praising Mumbai crowd for coming on Day 4, with India having only 3 wickets left is not well appreciated. As I said, if you are true fan, you'll watch anything that your team is involved in - even when they are practicing in nets (when I was a fan boy, I used to goto staduim one day before the tests just to watch our players doing nets). The Day 4 happened to be a Sunday and hence the crowd. So dont give credit where it is not due. Day 1 and Day 2 hardly had any crowd. I was able to stretch myself across 3 seats :)

Regarding Dharu - there is no stadium in India where alcohol is allowed. Not even in corporate or VIP boxes. I have been to a few of them and I can tell confidently about this. Absolutely no alcohol anywhere in India. Forget alcohol. Not even smoking is easy these days.

Whereas in England, where I watched the Ind Vs Eng in 2014, the only test that we wont in that series, there is a free flow of beers. There are beer gardens setup on all corners of the stadium where people create a picnic atmosphere. It appeared to me like many people came only drink and have a good time. Cricket was only an excuse.

Now regarding which venues should get matches every year or more often - I think BCCI has to create two buckets (a) Traditional venues and (b) New venuesc holidays in a row, which when combined with Sat/Sun will ensure there is huge crowds every day of the test. Similar festive days can be established for

Some of of your points you shared are valid but you are disagreeing for no reason as those are facts shared and not how I want the crowd to be like.  I see that you do not agree with me when I mention about "crowd not wanting to pay when we are bowling."  And when i praised them for coming out when we were 7 down. 

 

This is not how I want, this is what I am telling you that it has been going on in India and most part of the world. So there is nothing to agree or disagree with that.  I hope you get what I mean. You came out saying you disagree with me on that when I am simply stating the fact that people only come out mostly when india is batting. Ideally we all want them to go and watch all day and pack the stands. It is a fact and you know it that when India is batting, there is more crowd

 

Also I think anyone who watched the game on TV even a little bit, knows that the crowd was never full and Shastri kept mentioning the 20,000 attendance all day on both the days. So we know about it and yet this thread was created to appreciate the Mumbai crowd. 

 

Chennai and Bangalore are good as others mentioned already but Mumbai to me is more special and a better place on TV, has lot of history, and is the Home of Cricket in India and makes a better viewing regardless of how much discomfort you felt when you were comfortably able to lay down there in stands at Wankhede. 

[Cricketics]

52 minutes ago, Dinx - the Jinx said:

In my opinion Eden Gardens is still the Mecca of cricket in India. Dont tale the OPs claim seriously that Mumbai has suddenly become the MCG or Fenway park.

 

PS: I am not from Kolkatta. I am from Chennai and living in Bangalore these days

As you have visited many, you could be right but the point of this thread is not to talk crap about other grounds or put the other grounds below Wankhede.  None of that is mentioned in OP. It was just to praise the Wankhede which I felt. You do not have to take offence if you do not like it my opinion.

 

I feel Wankhede is more special place than some of the other grounds in India and that is it. It is to me the Home of Cricket in India and hence I want it to host a Test Match every year. 

 

I have no bias for Bombay. I have never lived there or have any family down there. I have nothing to do with Bombay. I saw the game and have been seeing for a while and I commented. To me, Bombay crowd is more in the game, syncs with the proper moments, even when someone is talking on the mic etc. 

 

 

[Cricketics]

4 hours ago, BeautifulGame said:

 

 

If you are moving a test match from Chennai at short notice ,the best option is to move it to Bangalore.Its the nearest place .Not sure how moving to Delhi the best place or option.

 

Either way weather has improved so there seems no reason to move from Chennai in the first place

By Delhi, I wanted India to play where we have our best test record recently and it would have been nice to play there and close the series 4-0.

 

Also with three stands down, things need to be sorted for once and for all. This has been on for a while.

 

I am fine with moving it to Bangalore but we have a really poor record in Bangalore, but hey, we might just prove it here.