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I remember few days after the Indian Premier League (IPL) was launched and the first stage of auction had just finished, my friend was remarking that how he can cheer for local team when it was full of international and non regional players.

I had argued to him then that although it might sound impractical, but it will happens moment the match starts. I told him that although I am not English, but I still follow EPL and always support ManU. So when I can support a foreign team full of foreign players, why can’t I support a regional team with different players? The discussion ended there.

But it was yesterday that this whole conversation came again to my mind. What triggered was this small incident.  I was getting some stuff at local bakery shop; the persons there were watching the match between Kolkata Knight Riders and Mumbai Indian. The sales person was in annoyed mood and when I asked him, he just had to say “Knight riders only 67 all out”.

 The middle aged lady there vented her anger and said “these guys only party, they don’t play”, this to me was a strong comment for IPL as till few days back it was regarded as just entertainment with no emotional / sentimental value attached to it.

But what happen next surprised me most, the lady literally prayed that Sachin should get out in next ball of Shohaib Akhtar. An Indian is praying for an Indian batsman to get out by a Pakistani bowler.  To me this was true sports where there is no differentiation between religion, cast, creed and even nationality, what mattered was winning and game played in true spirits.

Not able to hold my temptations I quizzed the lady about about the game, pat came the reply in rather Bengali accented English “I love kriket”