India play first-ever D/N Test: Tendulkar sits with Sheikh Hasina; Ganguly takes selfie with the crowd

The excitement in the City of Joy is reaching fever pitch as India plays its first-ever day-night Test at Eden Gardens. Team Bangladesh, led by Mominul Haque, won the toss and opted to bat first.

As cricket history is being made in Kolkata, Sachin Tendulkar and VVS Laxman were among those who joined Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, West Bengal Chief Minister Mamta Banerjee and BCCI president Sourav Ganguly to watch the match.

The Bengal tiger, as Ganguly is popularly known, took time out to click a selfie with the crowd. The newly crowned BCCI chief captioned the selfie, "Tremendous atmosphere at Eden for the pink test".



VVS Laxman, dressed in a blue blazer with a pink tie, tweeted from the stadium, saying that India may not have played with the pink ball before, but that wouldn’t stop them from turning pink at Eden. .


Our very own, ‘Bhajji’, Harbhajan Singh, too, couldn’t contain his excitement. . The 39-year-old, clad in a pink coat to commemorate the occasion, tweeted pictures with VVS Laxman at the stadium.

“...great to be here in city of joy,” wrote Singh.


Cricketer Vinay Kumar also posted a picture with the pink ball.


While the stadium was buzzing with elated fans taking to the stands in numbered jerseys, those away from the city also took to social media to share their excitement.

Former cricketer and commentator, Sanjay Manjrekar, shared his thoughts on the pink ball in a tweet, reiterating that the novelty is day-night Test, not the pink cherry.


The last year had spoken in favour of the format.

Earlier this week, the 54-year-old commentator, who has been a vocal supporter of the format, took to Twitter to talk about the trade-off between the number of people watching and playing conditions.

He said that we broadly have two choices, either have perfect playing conditions and less people watching or have less-than-perfect playing conditions and more people watching.


In the days leading up to the historic match, several cricketers, commentators and noted personalities had also been sharing their thoughts on Team India playing with the pink cherry for the first time.

While some lauded BCCI Chief Sourav Ganguly for taking the path-breaking decision of experimenting with the new format, others were a bit skeptical.

Gavaskar, who was the last former-skipper to head the BCCI, said on Thursday, “It's an exciting time. it's an exciting time for the world cricket as well, there hasn't been many pink ball Tests as well. In order to prepare even I've come in pink today... But this is just for commentary.”

Master blaster, Sachin Tendulkar, however, had a balanced take on the pink ball Test. While he was excited about a large number of people coming to the stadium, he didn’t want the standard of the game to be compromised.

“The whole thing is to bring in more people in the stadium adds a new element to Test cricket. That is important but at the same time, I feel we should also evaluate after the game, how much dew was there and whether cricket — the standard of play — was compromised there,” the maestro told PTI.

When asked if he thinks the Test will be successful, Tendulkar said, “It’s a good thing. We’ve shown that we, as a nation, want to move forward and try out new things. We try and then we see whether it’s successful or not. Success should not be measured just by the number of people inside the stadium. I think that is just one aspect.”

Cricketer-turned-politician Gautam Gambhir was keen on the idea of pink ball Test, saying the format is a ‘change that needs to be embraced’.

In a blog written for The Times of India, Gambhir opined, “I hope pink cricket ball does to Indian cricket what white did.”.

The brain behind the pink test, Sourav Ganguly tweeted sharing his excitement for the upcoming 5 days.


He also shared pictures of Kolkata being all decked up in pink on the landmark occasion.