In what is being considered a landmark occasion, India’s first day-night Test match will be played at Eden Gardens in Kolkata on Friday. This is the first time that Team India will play with the pink ball, and to mark the monumental moment, not just Eden but the entire city of Kolkata is decked up in pink.
The Board of Cricket Control in India (BCCI) tweeted a 17-second video, on Wednesday, showing how the City of Joy is preparing for the big match.
The video shows Eden Gardens stadium and several other landmark spots in the city shimmering in a pink hue.
The new BCCI Chief, Sourav Ganguly, who is the brain behind the first-ever day-night Test, also posted a picture of two skyscrapers shining in pink on his Twitter handle.
The historic match, between India and Bangladesh, will kickstart with Army paratroopers landing in Eden Gardens to hand over a pink ball to each of the two captains, just before the toss.
This will be followed by Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina (left) and West Bengal CM Mamata Banerjee (right) ringing the customary Eden Bell.
What Are Day-Night Tests?A day-night Test match, as the name suggests, is played either totally, or partially under floodlights (artificial stadium lighting) in the evening or night. The idea behind playing day-night Tests is to increase the footfall at the match, because a large number of cricket enthusiasts watch matches after workhours.
Friday’s Test match is particularly important, and as Virat Kohli calls it, a ‘landmark occasion’, because this is India’s maiden day-night Test match.
The Test match at Eden is coincidentally happening on the one-month anniversary of Ganguly being named BCCI Chief. The Bengal Tiger had given a go-ahead for the idea immediately after being appointed Chief
History Of Day-Night Test MatchesThe first day-night Test match was played in 2015 between Australia and West Indies. Since then 11 such matches have been played.
It’s not that India wasn’t invited to participate in the matches in the past. However, India has earlier always refused to participate in the pink-ball Test matches, even on instances when Australia and West Indies offered to host the country.
It was the lack of exposure to the format that has previously led the Indian cricket team to take the decision.
However, as it has been widely reported, skipper Virat Kohli said ‘yes’ to the pink ball experimental format within ‘3 seconds’ when Ganguly pitched the idea to him.
Prasanta Patnaik