The players had to play in front of empty stands. © Getty
The manner in which the Indian cricket board goes about the ticket distribution process season after season where international cricket is concerned, seems irrational. As if embarrassments caused in the past weren't a concern, this week the Vidarbha Cricket Association (VCA) made things worse for itself, as well as the BCCI, by waiting until the last minute to make tickets available for the World Twenty20 qualifiers to fans in Nagpur.
Scores of cricket fans were left clueless on Tuesday (March 8) when the VCA Stadium in Jamtha hosted a double-header - Hong Kong vs Zimbabwe and Afghanistan vs Scotland and those who wanted tickets had no idea where to buy them from. As a result, the matches were played to empty stands.
While a random draw of lottery system had been conducted online to sell tickets for matches involving the Indian team, fans had been expecting to buy tickets at the counter for the less popular games such as the qualifiers. "The stadium was empty and I thought I could have just bought a ticket and entered," said Ashok Naidu, who drove from the centre of the city to Jamtha approximately 18 kms to watch some cricket but was asked to go back to the city to buy tickets. Several fans were forced to return empty-handed from Jamtha.
On Wednesday, the VCA opted to send a press release to select media houses, saying tickets for the March 10 double-header would be made available at the old VCA stadium premises. However, the VCA did not share the press release with TOI, which left hundreds of readers clueless about buying tickets. "They could've certainly used some common sense and planned this better. Unless they were expecting online buyers to flood the gates for these qualifiers," a cricket official following the VCA ticket fiasco said.
A cricket website quoted a VCA official justifying that advertisements had been placed in local newspapers informing about the ticketing policy. However, the same official failed to explain why the information had not been passed on to the BCCI or the ICC so that fans could be updated about the same. Incidentally, Nagpur is home to BCCI president and International Cricket Council (ICC) chairman Shashank Manohar.
"It's the onset of summer and temperature is touching 40 degrees. Fans came all the way to Jamtha a long drive from the city limits on the national highway and had to return empty handed. The gates were locked and it was then that it occurred to them that no ticketing facilities were available at the stadium," the official added.
Tickets have been priced as low as Rs 100 for a single game and Rs 200 for the double-header. "Those who were still keen on watching the game had to go back all the way to the old stadium and return to Jamtha a drive of close to 36 km and ended up watching very little cricketing action," a journalist covering the World Twenty20 event said. For a stadium that boasts of a 45,000-capacity, the stands remained eerily empty as VCA took its own time trying to rectify things. The BCCI is responsible for the tournament's ticketing policy but state associations have the discretion to plan the distribution process. While most other stadiums hosting T20 matches have chosen to sell tickets at their respective stadium gates, the VCA strangely made plans that left the ordinary cricket fan reeling in the heat.
Once again, in trying to justify what had happened, a VCA official said: "Before criticising, you should see that today (March 10) everything went fine." For long now, the BCCI's ticketing policy for international matches has been a mess. It has perennially found itself at pains to clarify how many tickets it actually puts up for sale.
© TNN
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