Knock, knock. Who’s there? The World Cup, we are back in your city Pune
The HinduA majority of the 37,500-strong turnout will have to sit in open stands, that too in the October heat, at the Maharashtra Cricket Association stadium here on Thursday when India takes on Bangladesh in the ICC men’s cricket World Cup. “Ever since the cricket bug bit, all the elders I have interacted with keep discussing the 1996 World Cup match in Pune, when Kenya beat the mighty West Indies,” Walunj, 25, says. I have to be here to witness when the city that’s my home now is hosting its first World Cup match in my lifetime.” Walunj is obviously referring to the famous game that inserted Pune into a cricket World Cup quiz. Playing its maiden World Cup, Kenya stunned the West Indies by 73 runs at the Nehru Stadium — which was the home of cricket in Pune till the current stadium was readied at the beginning of the last decade. And then the miracle happened, so it’s weird to say I was there at the match but wasn’t there when Kenya won.” Starting with the high-profile clash between India and Bangladesh, the next three weeks will witness Gahunje — a village on the city’s outskirts off the Mumbai-Pune Expressway — host five World Cup games.
History of this topic
ODI Cricket World Cup 2023: The very best of HT's coverage
Hindustan Times
IND v BAN: A city reborn over the years, Pune gears up to welcome back World Cup cricket
The HinduDiscover Related
