t’s not been the easiest of weeks. Three games in seven days, all away from home and each ending in an anti-climactic loss. Even the excitement of coming face to face with SRK, Priyanka Chopra, Juhi Chawla, the Ambanis, the Mallyas, Deepika Padukone and yes, Sachin Ramesh Tendulkar has not been enough to overcome the disappointment of these performances. But we are not sitting around moping. As long as there is a mathematical chance of qualifying we will fight for it and even if we go down, we are determined to do it with a roar rather than a whimper.

The good news is that we are back home. Home, home again. It’s good to be here when I can. Sang the Beatles. And we agree. Especially after what we have been through, not just on the field, but the jibes we bear with a grin off it. It’s difficult to see the funny side of losses, but it does help to focus on the non-negatives when everyone around has already declared you as doomed. Andar ki Baat recollects a few moments from the road trip that has gone by that bring a smile.

Best Rub-it-in moment

An excellent batting performance has not been able to undo the damage that Sehwag did and Delhi have taken the two points. I am standing in the hotel lobby much after the game is over. My team jersey is quite a giveaway and I attract a lot of sympathetic as well as mocking attention. I am feeling like an invitation card for a punch-the-target party and sure enough many people go by pumping their fists and shouting Viroo, viroo at me. I want to run away but am stuck waiting for someone for a long while as the crowd of home supporters gradually thins to a trickle and then I am left almost alone to contemplate happier days.

Just then a group of teenage boys pass by and on spotting me walk up and innocently ask me which team won the match today. They seem to have no clue about the blistering game that has been on show and I tell them with a sigh that Delhi nicked it. On hearing this they break out into a laugh, stick their tongue at me and shout out in a chorus: Exactly! Delhi-Delhi. The brats knew it all along and just wanted to rub-it-in by hearing me say it.

Dada, game doosri side par hai

The atmosphere at the packed Eden Gardens is awe-inspiring and the city is dressed in team colors. The noise is deafening, the crowd sportingly hostile towards us and their team is on a roll. But the cricket only matters till Shah Rukh Khan and gang show up in their balcony. Then thousands stop following the game and focus their attention only towards the actor, who clearly remains as popular as ever in Kolkata. It helps that he is flanked by Priyanka Chopra and Juhi Chawla. The two stands below the star-studded balcony house a few thousand people who to the last KKR fan, turn away from the game and focus all their energies on getting a wave from the celebrities. SRK in turn cheers his team and obliges his fans. The men in the stand are eager to impress Priyanka too and every now and then a section of the crowd breaks into an off-key version of Desi Girl.

The people at KKR can just turn those seats around and charge extra when they are falling short of revenue targets. The funniest part of SRK’s total dominance of the show is a moment when he celebrates the fall of a KXIP wicket and the crowd below erupts in joy knowing what has happened without caring to take a look back at the game. This is called seeing the world through someone else’ eyes.

Better Never than Late?

I miss the Kolkata-Mumbai flight. To be fair to me, I (and a few others) have a slightly earlier flight to catch than the rest of the team as flights are too congested today to accommodate everyone in our traveling party together. But I am the only one who misses the flight thanks to the the heavenly sleep I get after eating enough macher jhol with rice topped by rosogollas to help me hibernate for six months. Anyway, when I reach the airport I find out that the next flight I can board is a few hours after the rest of the team leaves and so I settle down at the crowded Kolkata airport and instantly doze off again as empirical proof that there can never be too much of a good thing.

Guilt and shame act as powerful alarm bells and wake me up just in time to duck under a seat as most of the team arrives to board their flight. I am hoping that this will be my secret and I will reach Mumbai an unnoticed few hours late. However, that is not to be and when I finally check into the hotel in Mumbai, there is a reception party of cricketers taking a mighty dig at me and asking me to pay up the fine that latecomers for any team event are expected to pay. I wish I had abandoned ship and run away because that episode still remains a source of merriment and there are cheers for me every time I show up on time for anything.

And the award for bravery goes to

I am one of the three people who celebrate the dismissal of Sachin Tendulkar in Mumbai and live to tell the tale. Seriously though, the Mumbai crowd is friendly yet intimidating. The chant of Such chin-Such chin is intoxicating and in spite of your allegiance, you find yourself swaying a bit with the crowd. Malinga and Pollard are popular characters too while even Mumbai boys in our team find little favor with the locals. They reserve their greatest boos for us KXIP supporters in the stand though. When one of our batsmen hits a shot that seems to be headed for six, the handful of us who are there go up screaming. The collective will of the Mumbai crowd though, ensures that the ball reaches no where close to the boundary and instead a catch is taken. Cue a few thousand people shouting right back at us and telling us exactly who the boss is. That done, almost the entire stand breaks into laughter over this instantaneous change in reactions and we are forced to wave back at them and acknowledge their amused boos.

Dost dost naa raha

Even though Chris Gayle sends a few balls outside the Chinnaswamy Stadium and into Cubbon Park in Bangalore, we feel we can get the score we have been set to chase. But of course, it all starts going wrong from the very first ball. I have convinced a few friends who live there to where KXIP colors, wave KXIP flags and cheer us to a win and they are happy to oblige in the hope of being shown on television as they would be in a miniscule yet noticeable minority. In spite of some early wickets they keep up the flag waving and the good spirits surrounded by RCB fans. Then as the overs pass, we find our position go from bad to worse and it is soon clear that there is only going to be one winner in this game. And then right in front of everyone else’ eyes and behind my back, my friends get rid of their Kings Eleven T Shirts, pick up the nearest RCB flags available and start chanting with the home crowd. The unsubtle nature of their conversion generates a lot of laughter from those who surround us and I am soon held holding a solitary flag amidst a sea of opposition and some turncoat friends who pretend they were never with me in the first place.