First hand account of a hockey fan
It was the first, a never witnessed event – A jam-packed Hockey Stadium at Bangalore. The occasion was the first semi-finals of World Series Hockey between Karnataka Lions v Sher-e-Punjab.
This was the same stadium that hosted local, school-level, Super Division League matches, but none of them could ever gather a crowd more than a thousand people.
Stars came and left, displayed their class and played their hearts out but the synthetic turf located in the heart of Bangalore, was always open to visitors. None stops you entry from both gates, turf, stands and no restriction on movement either. The luxury had gone today. The same venue had hoards of people from all directions approaching the stadium with a number of check-points and security guards. Traffic police coordinated the vehicular movement and a brightly lit, noisy stadium greeted its audience from quite a distance.
Karnataka Lions had played its 7 matches here but for me it was the first match at the local stadium.
The view inside was unimaginable. A panoramic view of the East stand revealed people, people and only people. Even in the West stand, our friend found it difficult to hold space for us as the crowd kept pouring with little space left to sit. Desperation levels were high in the massive queque waiting to clear a security check.
Children, families, young people, middle-aged people, ladies, gents, singles, couples descended down to the stadium in various colors along with their banners. With electrifying music, cheer girls, dhols, drums, LCD display, electronic score-board, it was a dream-come-true setting for a Hockey fan.
Very interestingly, one got a feeling that spectators around were not much educated in Hockey. They just came to a stadium for a family outing – a Hockey match based family outing. Wow!
As the game progressed, I could see the happiness on the face of my friends who visited a sports stadium for the first time in their lives; they would go on to rate it as a memorable life-time experience. I presented a few facts and figures about the game but the crowd cheer, the dhol noise, the DJ made it difficult to communicate with a person sitting next to you.
The first quarter ended at 1-1 and even though Shers got their share of penalty corner early in the match, it looked like an even game.
The local public, apparently, for over the past one month or so, had developed an affinity for Karnataka Lions and had clearly come out in support of the Lions. As and when Lions picked the ball in the midfield and rallied down the flanks, the crowd roared for the Lions. Whenever Shers missed a chance, there was a ‘hoooooo….’ sound from the audience mocking at them. It was reminiscent of World Cup match in MDC Stadium, Delhi where it seemed that the whole stadium, without an exception, was supporting Indian team – a goal by opponents followed pin-drop silence and simple move by Indians created noise, high enough to reach India Gate.
However, amongst all the hulla-gulla, Lions performance kept disappointing as the game progressed. They wasted a couple of simple chances when Shers’ goalkeeper was beaten and only the formality of the last, well-directed push remained.
A rather one-sided match got over with a much deserved victory for Sher-e-Punjab, 4-1.
However, apart from all the yelling and the disappointment, watching a Hockey match in Bangalore amongst a packed crowd is like a dream come true for any Hockey fan.
A close friend once told me that sometime in mid-90s (possibly in 1995), India played against Pakistan – an international match – at this very stadium in front of empty stands because no one bothered to advertise it well to get public to the stadium.
After today, there will be some sense of redemption for hockey aficionados who would have dreamt for almost 15 years to see their own stands packed up with local people.