By IANS
Bangalore : It was tension twice over for Bangaloreans as the clock struck 4 Tuesday afternoon – India was tantalisingly close to a historic win Down Under while a victorious cricket team was landing at the airport with the Under-19 World Cricket Cup.
For those at home and in offices with access to TV channels, it was an endless switching of channels to know how many wickets India needed to beat Australia on their home soil, or how the Indian colts were being feted at the Bangalore airport.
The hundreds of fans gathered at the Hindustan Aeronautics Ltd (HAL) airport to greet the colts had one eye on the arrival terminal and the other on the SMSes flashing on the fall of one more Aussie wicket, or a hit to the boundary.
As the Aussies lost the 7th and then 8th wicket, even local TV channels decided to give a go-by to the arrival scenes of the juniors and hooked on to Star Sports channel to bring live the thriller from Down Under to viewers.
Crackers were burst in several localities in the city but youngsters rued that they could not ride through the city on their two wheelers, honking and waving the national flag as it was peak rush hour.
“How wonderful it would have been if the match had ended late in the evening, say around 10 p.m. Me and my friends could have roared across the city’s streets to celebrate the historic victory,” said Praveen, a 20-year-old college goer.
There was a little disappointment that local lad Robin Uthappa got out when he seemed to be in control of the situation and had put on more than 90 runs for the first wicket with Sachin Tendulkar.