The Hindu : Front Page : Scalpers make hay as tickets become scarce

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Saturday, Sep 29, 2007
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Scalpers make hay as tickets become scarce

Staff Reporter

It’s the stadium for the haves and the idiot box for the have-nots

Everyone’s choice: Vendors selling posters of Indian cricketers in front of Chinnswamy Stadium in Bangalore on Friday. — Photo: Sampath Kumar G. P.

BANGALORE: The one-day international cricket match between India and Australia has the city divided into the haves and the have-nots. While the smug haves are dreaming about what is in store for them at the Chinnaswamy stadium tomorrow, frustrated have-nots are running helter-skelter hoping for tickets somehow.

The excitement is gradually building for the first in the seven-match ODI series beginning Saturday. The air is thick with news of tickets selling in the black for huge premiums, and anyone even tenuously linked to the cricket administration, players or the media is being hounded by friends, relatives and families for that elusive ticket.

Fans, who stood in long queues and got the tickets, are not satisfied. They can’t have enough of the players. A day before the match, many hung around the stadium hoping to somehow sneak through the strict security and, maybe with some luck, get the autographs of the cricketing demigods as they practise at the nets.

Naveen, a service executive, was standing with his friend, puffing away furiously. He was expecting a friend who had promised to get him into the stadium. “I can’t wait to go inside. I am hoping I can get close enough to get some autographs,” he said.

The police were on their toes going through with the security drill. They have to manage a crowd of nearly one lakh that will swarm around the stadium to watch what many hope will be a heart-stopping contest.

On Friday afternoon, there were many others around the stadium hoping to catch a glimpse of their cricketing heroes. A view through the windows of the bus carrying the cricketers was all that they were looking for. Even as the air-conditioned coach with the Australian cricketers arrived at the venue, people rushed towards it, waving their hands excitedly. The Australian cricketers seemed out of sync, as they could not understand the adulation of the Indian fan. No one from inside the bus waved back. But the fans were not disappointed. They resumed their vigil seated on the grassy median across the stadium.

There were those selling posters of Indian cricketers. Predictably, the latest poster boy of Indian cricket, Mahendra Singh Dhoni, was the hot-selling favourite. The Big Three were left behind, but not abandoned.

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