More than 15,000 people, a majority of them of Indian origin, came from around the country in planes, trains and automobiles, to Lauderhill, Florida, to watch their favorite game played by the top-guns. Cricket, a game that was familiar to American founding fathers but faded from the memory of an American public mad about baseball and football, made its comeback in the U.S. August 27th and 28th.
It was India versus West Indies at the first ever Twenty20 International (T20I) played on American soil with the likes of cricket giants Mahendra Singh Dhoni and Virat Kohli of India, and Chris Gayle and Dwayne Bravo of West Indies.
It almost didn’t matter that the second match played on 28th was called off due to rain and West Indies walked away winners by the skin of their teeth because of a one-run victory on the first day, the audience was thrilled by all accounts. They waved flags, passed around samosas, and exchanged Bollywood moves, ESPN’s Cricinfo.com reported. Even some non-Indian cricket lovers flew in from North Carolina and Texas and spouted technical terms like ‘googly” and “chase” by virtue of having Indian friends or partners. “I’m glad that cricket is coming to the United States,” Stephanie Reiland, a lawyer from Alabama, told ESPN.
In fact, according to news reports, cricket fans arrived on the eve of the match, to watch their favorite players practice at Central Broward Regional Park Stadium Turf Ground in Lauderhill one day before the actual Saturday match, eagerly taking selfies and getting autographs.
For the duration of the match, it felt like the tournament was being played in India, news reports said, as Tamil, Hindi, Telugu and English languages floated around the stands. It was “surreal” for some fans who came from as far away as Chicago, Louisiana, Washington, D.C., and Los Angeles, the news report said.
Mike Singh from California, called cricket the “mother sport” that brought Indians in India and America together. Ten-year old Krish Patel told Cricinfo, he grew up watching Kohli and Dhoni. He and his father Mayank Patel belong to the Bolingbrook Cricket League in Illinois.
“This is a big deal for Krish. For him to see legends and future legends that he grew up watching is a big deal,” Mayank Patel told Cricinfo.
Following a major PR drive for almost a year, with major cricketers from the two countries touring the U.S. to draw crowds, servers crashed when ticket sales opened, according to some fans like Sankar Renganathan and his friends from Alabama, who ended up having to call the phone number on the website to buy their seats, they told ESPN.
While some wanted India to win and others were rooting for West Indies, it was more about being part of history – to be able to say they watched the first official series played in the U.S.
After bowling out the West Indies for 143 in 19.4 overs, India were 15/0 in two overs when the dark clouds hovering over Lauderhill opened up, interrupting the play, Indo Asian News Service reported. Though the rain stopped the match was called off because of a wet outfield, and the Windies bagged this series, because of their victory in the Saturday encounter.
In the second match, Indian bowlers markedly improved and it seemed the team would share the victory.
Jasprit Bumrah (2/26), Mohammed Shami (2/31), Amit Mishra (3/24) and Ravichandran Ashwin (2/11) showed they could get under the skin of the West Indian players, who unlike the first game where they slammed 245 for 6, did not get the scores the second time round, BCCI and Indo Asian News Service reported. Windies players fell like pin balls and were bowled out for 143.
“Such was the improved performance that West Indies batsmen who seemed unstoppable in the first game, failed to generate any momentum on Sunday. Not only did they hit 102 fewer runs, the big hits too dried up as only six shots cleared the boundary while on Sunday they had smashed 21 sixes,” noted a news report by Board of Control for Cricket in India, BCCI.
But rain forced the Indians off the field early into their game on the second day.
Carlos Braithwaite, West Indies skipper, praised the Indian bowlers saying they executed their plans really well. “We tried our best, but didn’t get the score we wanted,” he said, adding however, that his team was confident it would have defended their first match total of 243, NDTV reported.
Dhoni differed. “If you compare the two games, you’d wonder if we were playing on the same wicket. I’m not saying we would have definitely won, but a good batting effort would have seen us through after 140 odd.” He praised his bowlers for putting up an “exceedingly” good performance.
Foxsports called the T20 International a “big step” to conquer an untapped market in the U.S. The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) playing a leadership role in making it happen. Anurag Kashyap, president of BCCI, announced early on that the match will be developed into an annual cricketing event in the U.S. The Central Broward Regional Park was the primary choice as a venue because it is the only approved ground to play international cricket in the U.S. and has hosted a series of international matches before this T20 International.
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