Stands apart

The Mumbai Cricket Association has a ready explanation for putting just 4,000 tickets on sale for the World Cup final at Wankhede Stadium on April 2. The MCA pleads helplessness in putting more tickets on sale,saying the largest chunk has to be handed over to the ICC for distribution to tournament sponsors and partners and to affiliated clubs. The MCA may have an excuse that is trotted out before every big match and this squeeze on the ticket-buying spectator is certainly not limited to Mumbais stadia but it is a reminder of the subversion of the way sport is administered in this country,as too the effect of this sidelining of the spectators rights.

Its not just cricket. A few months ago,as Delhi embraced the Commonwealth Games,ticket-buying spectators asserted not just their numbers through the sales collections but also their fidelity by showing the contrast at many venues between their packed stands and the patchy attendance in the reserved ones. In cricket,the ticket-buying spectator is an alienated constituency. As the Wankhede numbers show,her chances of showing up at the ground for the big events are extremely slender. The telecast-driven commerce of the sport means revenue from tickets matters little in big events,and in this World Cup certainly the fan not networked enough to wrest a ticket will be little missed.

But this tournament takes place at a time when Twenty20s popularity has sparked anxiety about the longer formats of

the game. Cricket through the decades has been kept going by the informed spectator who turns up for the quiet matches too. By marginalising her so spectacularly,the sport snaps her connect with the stadia and dissuades her from turning up for the regular events. And then cricket agonises over falling attendance at Tests!