If Guwahati offered some sparklers on opening night of ISL3 on Saturday, Kolkata pulled out the fireworks on day two at a venue usually so nondescript that it was considered something of a local relic. On an evening that began, damp and dank and desultory, the ISL3's Kolkata chapter sprang to life when home team Atletico de Kolkata snatched a 2-2 draw from defending champions Chennaiyin FC, with an 86th-minute equaliser penalty.
The match also gave to its tiny, and slightly derided venue, the Rabindra Sarobar Stadium, a new layer of veneer. The ISL is made for and of sports television hyperbole and on Sunday it arrived early. The Rabindra Sarobar Stadium was introduced to the smattering of spectators before the game as "the brand, new home ground" of Atletico de Kolkata; except that it was built in 1961 had its last footballing life as home ground to local club Tollygunge Agragami and stated its last big match, twelve years ago, when Tollygunge played in what was then called the National League. Very much Indian, just not so Super, two months ago, its approach roads had, locals say, knee high-grass.
The stadium is named after the artificial lake in the area and sits unobtrusively in a leafy residential district. Its neighbours are neither the parking lot nor the netherworld end of a suburban train line, but a cinema hall called Menoka showing MS Dhoni - the Untold Story and the latest Bollywood hit called Pink, a bakery, a homeopathy clinic and a cut-price kind of "business college." On match afternoon, it was crawling with flag-sellers, face-painters and bandana-salesmen. The arrival of the rowdies won't make the local bhadralok happy but there is no denying that a tired, shabby venue, usually host to the annual sports days of local schools, has been turned into a graceful, even boutique, football ground. Its expansive, open stands and a modest club pavilion are surrounded by a thicket of trees, two large apartment blocks gazing over on one side and a train line that runs within audible distance. The bleachers have been cleaned and freshly painted, new bucket seats installed on the tony side covered in ATK's red and blue, and featuring temporary floodlights which went up only ten days ago.
For India's richest and most glitzy football competition to park itself on a ground with a maximum capacity of 11,500 in Kolkata of all cities, at first appearance was putting out a stall of low expectations. With less than 30 minutes to go on Sunday, the Rabindra Sadan ground was not even half full. This is Puja season and there's a cricket Test on a short drive north and besides it had rained in the afternoon. The rains had turned the roads leading to the ground into mini-pond-lets and footpaths into mossy skating rinks. There were policemen milling about as they always do at a Kolkata event, in various shades of uniforms, including serious riot gear, offering little useful direction, and there were often frequent breakouts of loud arguments between organisers and ticket holders to be heard.
The real reason Rabindra Sarobar became "home" for ATK and its raucous fans, is because the giant Salt Lake stadium is being readied for the under-17 world cup next year. On Sunday evening, as the chants of "Aay-tee-kay" grew so loud that they would have disturbed the retirees of South Kolkata, the crowds kept coming in. By the end of the match, it was tabulated that 10,000 plus had turned up, giving Kolkatawallas a good game and their voice easily doubles the presence. As the ISL moves on, there is a good chance that a stadium with 11,500 seats could turn into the hottest ticket in town, if only crowds could be kept under control and ATK keep winning.
On Sunday, it turned out fine for the home team, after two soft goals in the second half which left them contemplating defeat in their season opener. They had more shots on goal and had led in the 59th minute before going into a defensive free-fall. Conceding two goals within five minutes of each other showed up their defensive line as porus and requiring re-examination. ATK were handed a piece of fortuitous foolhardiness from the youngest man on the field, 16-year-old Jerry Lalianzuala, who brought down goalscorer Sameehg Doughtie in the box, and the penalty equaliser came less than five minutes from the whistle.
ATK's many opportunities were created by their marquee player Helder Postiga and the lung-busting work rate of South African flanker Doughtie. Of the Indian players, Chennaiyin's Jeje Lalpekhlua may be listed as a forward but played more of an attacking, feeder role in the centre; he was however the man who inadvertently created the first goal-scoring opportunity for Jayesh Rane. Jeje's shot on goal was not powerful enough to challenge the goalkeeper, but set up Rane's 66 minute equalizer. Six yellow cards split evenly between both teams was frustration, desperation and muddled thinking, in an evening of both beauty and some ugliness. At the end of the game, 2-2 was an accurate reflection of what had gone by.
What was also proved was that the Rabindra Sarobar Stadium could turn out to be the most non-conformist, eccentric venue in the ISL's third season, coming from what remains a largely eccentric, individualistic city.
The organsiers will tell you that to get to this point of an actual ISL game, never mind the chaos and logistical snafus, was a miracle in itself. The hubbub over the use of the ground become a point of friction between ATK-ISl and local conversationists. Environmentalists from the area complained that their "eco-friendly national park," and a "no plastic and no firecracker zone" would be sullied by the noisy carbon footprint of football. Migratory birds, they said, began their journeys to these parts around football season and this football nonsense would drive them elsewhere. They were made to concede in inches and ATK staged its first home game of 2016, but the green lobby are determined to ensure that the light towers be dismantled after the League and all other football in the new and improved Rabindra Sarobar stadium only include daytime matches.
More episodes of this jatra will no doubt follow. Kolkata's first match of ISL3 has let a genie out of a bottle and given the city a perfectly serviceable, old but "brand new" football ground. Which football person in Kolkata wouldn't want to fight for it?