The tremulous journey of a PWI fan

It’s been a tremulous journey if there ever was one. April 4^th, 2012 – almost a new dawn – a day when schedules were altered, appointments changed, lists of excuses created, savings dipped into and favourites chosen; all done in preparation of the 53 day long festival that is the IPL. Old hopes were recreated and new ones established, and amongst all this chaos was the quiet hope that emitted from the fans of the newest team – a team that almost wasn’t going to play. The Pune Warriors India had not had a good run in their debut season and to make matters worse, their captain was not playing on account of being unwell. But while good wishes headed to the captain for a speedy recovery, hopes were pinned on the previous mentor and current skipper. The great Dada had led the national team to many victories, and not much different was expected in the IPL. The quiet hope turned into roaring cheers as PWI’s fans supported their team from the get go. And that is where the saga began – not for the team itself, but for the fan, who sat by the television watching every ball of every match that Pune played with fingers crossed, praying that his team would show what it was capable of.

The Warriors’ opening match was against MI, one of the favourites. So when PWI managed to beat Mumbai on Mumbai’s home ground, Pune was in a state of chaotic happiness. If they could beat Mumbai, they’re not the same they were last time – they’re definitely better. Two days later, when Pune played on their home ground, the newly launched Subrata Roy Stadium, the sight was one never seen before. Not one seat in the stadium was empty. The fans had turned up in droves to see the team that would clean the slate of the old reputation of being the underdogs. And backed by their fans, the PWI sent the visiting KXIP packing, another feather in their cap.

PWI and KXIP came face to face within days and KXIP showed that they were no easy team. But when Pune lost the match on Punjab’s home ground, most people chalked it up to the power of revenge – Punjab wanted to get even and they did. The unsaid sentiment though remained simple – history may repeat itself and Pune’s Warriors were going to end up more or less at the bottom of the table.

But then they defeated Chennai and the world was good again. Or so everyone hoped. PWI went on to lose the next two matches and finally won their first match against Delhi. But Delhi evened the score three days later. That match marked the fall of the Warriors – a fall that they never recovered from as they proceeded to lose the next eight matches.

That’s still not as bad as Deccan Chargers, you say? The how about the fact the PWI was the only team that DC beat – twice? And ignore it as much as you’d like, DC still tried, they never threw away games like PWI seemed to do. The match between PWI and KKR at Eden Gardens, claimed as the biggest game of the series because of Dada and Shahrukh Khan’s history fizzled out like a drowning firecracker. KKR won that one and to make things worse, even defeated PWI on their own home ground in the last qualifier the two teams played.

Chalk up the reason to whatever you wish – too much shuffling of players, their best players missing from action, not enough training, the often questioned absence of Tamim Iqbal, too much dependency on a single player like Steven Smith (who is human after all) or a captain’s insistence on proving himself a great player when the time was just not right, but PWI was not winning.

Their playing went from aggressive to meek and their matches went from slow to boring. And while most of those who watched them on TV gave up wasting three hours every other day to watch their team lose, the stadium never emptied. You can think of that as hopeless naiveté – what other reason did anyone have for supporting a team that was only dropping in ranks, not only on the points table but even on the fair play award table? The Fair Play award is subjective, but it does denote the enthusiasm with which the players of a team play. So if PWI was, at one point, even below DC on that table, why was the stadium full? The answer, as it turned out, was because the stadium was brilliant and people loved watching a live match. They knew their team was going to lose, but they went for the experience.

Two seasons down and the reason the fans of the Pune team go to see a match is because of the stadium! That says a whole lot about the team that plays T20 matches like a five day test. It’s been a tremulous journey for the Pune fans. They hoped, they cheered, they were elated, they got disappointed, only to be pleasantly surprised and then they watched as their team went from bad to worse, hoping against hope that they’d win at least for the sake of their Warrior name if nothing else. The experience hasn’t been very different from last year’s but hopefully, will be very different from next year’s. There’s that hopeless optimism again! But what do you expect? That’s the life of a fan!