A time before home runs

Cricket is not new to America. In fact, the sport counted Benjamin Franklin and Abraham Lincoln among its early fans

- BECHU S.

Surbhi Gupta was in a race against time outside New York’s Nassau County International Cricket Stadium. Team India’s presser after its campaign opener against Ireland was over and Rohit Sharma’s men were on the way out. She had a few minutes to find the perfect spot to watch them boarding the team bus.

She did find a spot a little away from the crowd. Apart from a middle-aged guard hired by the stadium management, she was largely alone as she waited. “Maybe your main man has left in a car or something...,” the guard said. Having seen Rohit and Virat Kohli board the bus after a warm-up game at the same venue a few days prior, Gupta knew that was not the case. She told him the “main man” and his buddies would be out soon.

“You know, the FBI is here... these guys should be such stars,” said Taylor (name changed), amused by the craze. Gupta confirmed they were indeed celebrities back home and the security would only be tightened further for the India-Pakistan contest. “Sad I would not be on duty for that game,” he said. “Maybe I will tune in from home. But what’s the point, I don’t get the rules.”

Taylor, like most Americans today, is unaware that Benjamin Franklin had brought a copy of 1774 Laws, the then official rule book of cricket, to the US in 1754, 38 years ahead of the formation of India’s first cricket club in Calcutta. It is also unlikely that they know that when the USA met Canada for the first recorded international cricket game in New York’s St George’s Club (Sep 24-26, 1844), the first summer Olympics of modern history was still 52 years away.

The US is not a land yet to embrace cricket, as most think. Rather, it was a pioneer of the game, which attracted American spectators in thousands two centuries ago.