The cheer pressure of the audience!
Audience cheering is always a very important thing, as it acts as a boost and an encouraging phenomena, for a phenomenal success. But lately, I have observed a couple of situations where the audience, in the name of cheering our sports people, might have in fact brought about negative thoughts and added a bit of pressure in a crunch situation.
The first case is the Leander-Vardhan match. They were facing a match point; they saved one. They moved onto a break point and somehow had lost the chance, and it was deuce. A person from the audience, whose voice can clearly be identified as an Indian, shouted, ‘Come on..Come on..Double Fault!’. He was asking the opponent to do a double fault, so our people can have the break point again. It looked odd! Though it was meant as a joke, it didn’t deliver the push or the cheering that should have lifted the spirit of our players in that crunch situation. It acted as a boost for the good serving and mighty opponent, to concentrate more, bring in intensity and finish off the match. Llodra, in fact, served better and looked more focussed than on previous occasions.
Add to it the intense man Tsonga on his side! We were in fact expecting some luck, some courtesy from our opponents. But we were also egging on our well talented players to play more than their capabilities, to scroll through the finish line! So, if we believe in luck, and not our players, we will never be able to go till the finals. Can we expect our opponents to make mistakes each time we are in peril? Is it the right way of cheering? Honestly, I haven’t seen worse cheering than that one in any of the previous tennis matches. Everyone wishes their player plays to the fullest of their abilities, and cheers by clapping to the loudest giving slight hints of boost through ‘Hoos and haas’.
Ok, so it was just one person who cheered in that way. It’s not the case with others who, without reading this article, will be in their best international sporting spirit! And I convinced myself on that day the same way. But later next day, when Saina Nehwal was playing against the Danish opponent in the Round of 16 and was leading all the way, people started the chants, ‘Sainaaa, Sainaaa, Indiaaaa, Indiaaaa’(no claps, nothing). And it happened. Saina, who was playing well till that point, lost a few points and was not at her best, but somehow she managed to win that !
But, anyhow if we have this sporting spirit (not all, for those who might have this behavior), there’s certainly a better way to cheer our people and encourage sportsmen than getting some antagonistic reactions from the sportsmen. For others, it is just a documented proof of our thoughts.