IndvsAus T20I: HCA goofs up match start time on tickets

HYDERABAD: Troubles, arising out of its own lapses, seem to be unending for the Hyderabad Cricket Association (HCA). With hours left for the India vs Australia T20 International match to begin, the HCA drew flak yet again, this time over the alleged misprinted match tickets. In the latest of the series of horrendous mistakes, the cricket body was accused of wrongly printing the scheduled start of the match, to be played at the Rajiv Gandhi Stadium in Uppal here.

The HCA has been in the news ever since the sale of tickets for the third India-Australia T20 match has begun. Fans had openly criticised the HCA for their carelessness, be it in the sale of the tickets or other arrangements.

Coming close on the heels of the recent stampede at the Gymkhana Grounds, the start time of the match was wrongly printed on the tickets, prompting netizens to troll the HCA heavily once again. Though the tickets were officially on sale for the last 10 days, the HCA could not detect the glaring blunder on the tickets. The start time of the match was printed as 7:30 pm as against the scheduled start of 7 pm, preceded by the toss of the match at 6:30 pm.

Interestingly, an email sent out by HCA to the media on Saturday night mentioned the start time correctly as 7 pm. However, the cricket body, already mired in several controversies, chose not to acknowledge the printing lapse on the tickets. Netizens on social media platforms were quick to latch on to this and troll the HCA for its callousness. They felt that the wrong start time would mislead the fans heading to the stadium and rob them of precious cricket entertainment by half an hour.

The HCA has also come under fire over the allotment of tickets for public sale. It is alleged that not even half of the total 39,000 tickets were made available for sale to the general public for the T20I match.

Fans had been making a beeline at the Gymkhana grounds over the last few days to buy tickets at the counters after Paytm, the official ticket partner for ticket sales, had announced that there were no more available online. Reportedly, Paytm had only sold 3,000 tickets.

A few days ago, confusion and chaos over the ticket sale prompted the police to lathicharge the fans leading to a stampede at the Gymkhana Grounds. Many were injured in the unfortunate incident. Despite severe criticism from all quarters, HCA president and former India captain Mohammed Azharuddin refused to take the responsibility for the incident and the chaos over ticket sales.

On the other hand, fans also took the cricket body to task over the quality of arrangements made in the stadium for the match. They posted photos of Uppal stadium seats full of dust and bird drops, which went viral on social media.