CRICKET | Knock, knock. Who’s there? The World Cup, we are back in your city Pune

Pune, once a pensioner's paradise, is now an IT hub. On Thurs, 37.5K will gather at the Maharashtra Cricket Association stadium to witness Pune's first World Cup match in 25 yrs. Shubham Walunj, an IT professional, is among them, eager to experience the city's transformation. Pune has hosted two games in 5 ICC events, and will host 5 more in the next 3 wks. Will the Punekars support the World Cup for the remaining games?

A 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. But hardly any of them will be complaining. After all, most of them are expected to be Gen Z or Millennials.

Shubham Walunj, an IT professional, is one among them. Walunj — who spent his formative years in Rajgurunagar — a town almost 50kms from Pune before pursuing higher education here — depicts the changing landscape of the city to precision.

From being regarded as the pensioner’s paradise, Pune emerged as a student city before transforming into an IT hub over the last two decades. But Walunj — along with a group of friends and colleagues — has taken a day off at work on Thursday.

“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 wasn’t even born then but I have heard so many tales of the game. 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.

Also read: The 1987 World Cup in numbers