The visceral beauty of fandom

I have, over the years, been sceptical of the notion of the "fan". In my mind, the idea is saturated with unsavoury connotations. A fan is the chump who is willing to fork over enormous sums of money to buy clothing and memorabilia with emblems of his or her team. In a ridiculous reversal, the franchise is paid by the fan so that the fan can advertise it. To be a fan is to be a part of the show whose first purpose is to make a lot of money for very few people. The details of the sport don't seem to matter very much. Fans don't ask too many questions, and the presenters of the show - the commentators on TV, and the reporters on the beat - don't provide too many answers. A whole language has emerged due to this new alliance. It has emerged largely in franchise cricket, but is slowly creeping into the representative game as well, especially the short-form versions.

How many fans of the Indian cricket team care if India's ace offspinner, potentially one of the most productive all-round cricketers of his era, is getting enough match practice in first-class cricket? How many fans care if India play practice matches against serious opposition in the lead-up to major Test series? By care, I don't just mean talk about it. By care, I mean, vote with their wallets and their attention.

Fandom begets empty punditry and vacuous commentary. Take two phrases that have become commonplace in today's professional game. The first is the mantra about adaptation. The second is the nonsense about "executing plans". Each originated among pundits and received a boost when punditry went micro on Twitter.

"Players must learn to adapt to different formats". The people who came up with this guff are not exactly autodidacts. No one who has actually had to learn anything would bandy this phrase about as though it were some magic spell. Asking a young fast bowler of 21 to "adapt" to all three formats is a bit like asking someone to beat Viswanathan Anand at chess while cooking a fine dinner for ten while reciting the Mahabharata backwards. Such supermen are rare. And even these polymaths need time and the right conditions in which to learn.

"They executed their plans". The phrase was born to that black hole of thinking and information called the post-match interview and its nihilistic spouse, the post-match press conference. It is difficult to imagine an emptier phrase. "They were on the field" comes to mind.