Don't dare try pulling cricket down in India...!!!

Mr. Shimit Amin(the director of chak-de-India),Sania Mirza,Leander Paes,Narain Karthikayen,Mahesh Bhupathi the Indian football and hockey teams(men's of coruse!)I've got some BAD news for all of you and many others whom I've not mentioned here.

YOU CANNOT MATCH THE PUBLICITY AND ATTENTION OUR DEAR CRICKETERS GET.

It's simple as that.No matter how much we criticise them for failing to get past Bangladesh in the World Cup,how much we curse them for concentrating more upon shooting ads rather than on their game,however much we hate every batsman(and bowler) for not scoring a hundred(taking 5 wickets) in each innings,the fact remains that we follow every move of our cricketers,that's why we find so many points for/against them.

Today was that kind of day when you couldnt have written the script better for a cricket match involving India.Settings of The Oval,Indian bowlers drawing first blood by knocking back their top order for nothing,then the recovery,a few run outs and a late cameo by Mascarenhas which saw Yuvi carted for five consecutive sixes off the last five balls of the England innings....
....and then the counter attack by the tried and tested(and also criticised) duo of Sachin and Sourav,both falling in quick succession,then the departure of Dravid and Yuvraj(who took with them our hopes of winning),the cameo by Uthappa and INDIA winning a close match!!!

You'll never realise the emotions attached with this until you've been a part of the celebrations in our hostel t.v. rooms,on the streets,on the famous "chaiwallah's shops" and countless such places.The most introverts of audience were dancing and swirling their shirts above their heads,people hugging each other,Rahul Dravid,the perfect gentleman,pumping up his fists and jumping up and down like a 20-yr old,Yuvraj singh running onto the field and hugging Uthappa for so long that it might have given dirty minds so much "other things" to think...........these scenes underline what cricket means to us.It's religion and it'll always be.
Our heart still misses a beat when an appeal goes up against Sachin......
We still engage in debates regarding where the Indian captain went wrong tactically..
We still turn up the second last pages of newspapers before going through the details of the first page...
We become more nervous than Sachin himself in the nervous ninties...
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.. and we'll continue to be like that.Some things will just never change.
Once again..sorry to the people mentioned in the first paragraph.period.