Test cricket doesn’t normally require setting an alarm for 5.45am. One of the game’s charms is a leisurely late-morning start. Not in Ahmedabad on Thursday to start the fourth and final match between India and Australia. With the prime ministers of the respective countries due to make a ceremonial appearance, and security ramped up accordingly, working media were told to arrive hours early or risk being cordoned off outside.
What followed was a bizarre display of pageantry that, on reflection, should be no surprise when a leader named Narendra Modi visits a place named Narendra Modi Stadium. It is a short path for a leader to start being treated as a ruler. Ahead of further economic discussions to bolster an existing free trade agreement, Modi and his Australian counterpart, Anthony Albanese, arrived to applause in front of a huge sightscreen featuring both of their likenesses in a Photoshop movie poster pose, Modi’s image naturally slightly larger and further in front.
Ushered on to a podium on the field of play along with officials from the Board of Control for Cricket in India, they watched a dance performance while competing to see who could remain the most impassive, sitting with hands folded in laps and stern expressions. While the boisterous commentator, Ravi Shastri, provided a voiceover extolling 75 years of Indo-Australian friendship, the leaders embarked on a slow lap of honour from a specially crafted open vehicle. Adorned at its back with a splayed cardboard fan of oversized cricket bats and stumps, it was like Angry Anderson had swapped engineering tips with Cersei Lannister in Game of Thrones.
Stadium pillars and concourses were also plastered with pictures of the leaders, as had been roadsides all through the Gujarat capital in the days leading up. This is Modi country, the base of support for a leader who is approaching a decade in the job on a swell of Hindu populism that shows little sign of easing. It’s natural to draw parallels with Donald Trump, who received Modi’s open admiration as US president, and who attended a rally at the same stadium in 2020 where he famously mangled pronouncing the names of Sachin Tendulkar and Virat Kohli.
For a leader who refuses to do interviews or press conferences, governing by video broadcast and by public appearance is the alternative. Kirribilli does not offer the star power of the White House, but Albanese’s visit is still an opportunity to show Modi as a statesman, a taster ahead of the G20 summit to be held in New Delhi in September. Indian airports are full of posters advertising this, some of them describing India as “the mother of democracy”. The Ancient Greeks might file a copyright claim.
The lap of honour done, national captains Rohit Sharma and Steve Smith got dragged in, each presented by his respective national leader with a team cap. Then came an awkward raising of clasped fists with the four of them standing in a line, a particular favourite move of Modi’s Bharatiya Janata party. Finally, with the entourage led indoors to look at a museum of cricket history between the teams, the toss could take place while the ministers had time to contemplate their gifts from the BCCI: each took home an ornately framed portrait photo of himself.
Through it all, cricket was pushed to the sidelines. Players were blocked from warming up on the ground as normal, instead shunted onto the second oval. The bowlers were sent out to mark their run-ups before 8am. All except Mohammad Shami, who had not at that point been named in the Indian XI, and had to sprint out just before the anthems. The anthem rendition was another irregularity, normally taking place once at the start of a series. The leaders lined up with the teams to sing it, arms around shoulders. Those teams had played a close-fought series whose culmination depended on this match, then seen it become a backdrop.
Not that there was a huge audience for the show, and that stood out most of all. There had been a lot of talk in the lead-up of the BJP bringing in busloads of supporters to fill the stadium, wanting to demonstrate the popular appeal of their leader. The secondary aim was setting a new record Test crowd beyond the 91,112 at the MCG for the 2013 Ashes Test. Whatever the reason, on the day it never got close. When the dignitaries arrived, the ground-level stands were at best half full, the huge top tier at more like 20%. While the prime ministers left the ground within an hour, some of the spectators even stayed for the cricket.
