Indian cricket deserves better than the cupcake catastrophe

First, fans rolled their eyes at the unfunny ad in which a Pakistan fan encounters four India supporters outside a lift and speaks of cricket's "greatest rivalry". Only for the Indians to belittle him with a mocking reference to their team's then 7-1 advantage over Pakistan in the tournament.

A lone cupcake sits on the top level of a high-tea stand as an India supporter strolls towards it, eyes on the prize and empty plate in hand - only to be beaten to the punch by a South Africa fan, who swoops in and snatches the cake in his bare hand.

The supposed Saffer speaks in a strange muddle of an English and an Australian accent. He doesn't sound at all South African. On top of that, if there is a joke in all this it's on the Indian, who delivers most of what he says in Hindi. Good luck finding South Africans not of Indian heritage who understand that language.

A poor misrepresentation of a South African being lectured, pompously and churlishly, in a tongue that makes no impression on him? Maybe there is something funny in this mess after all, but not in the way the ad's makers intended. South Africans who have seen it are laughing at them, not with them.

Many less prominent Indians were on the same page. "To all South African and non-Indian cricket fans: this is not how we feel about your teams," one posted. "This petty ad campaign is ridiculous, shameful, and lacks creativity. It doesn't represent us Indian fans at all. Please ignore it. Let's celebrate cricket together." Another damned the campaign as having "0 creativity. 0 nostalgia. 0 depth in cricketing discussions".

This will be refreshing to South Africans who have not had the privilege and pleasure of watching cricket in India. All they have is the received view that the game "is a religion" in this "cricket-mad country". The truth is, of course, more nuanced.

Yes, you do find Indians who openly admire Hansie Cronje, despite the fact that he was a corrupt, conniving crook. Many of them continue to wax worshipful about AB de Villiers almost eight years after he ended his international career and more than four years after he last picked up a bat in the IPL.

But South Africans and others should know that the Indian interest in cricket - it would be patronising to call it an obsession - goes way beyond the sadder limits of celebrity culture. There is an intellectual hunger here for parsing the game's finest points; for debating, for hours on end, who should bat where in any team you might care to mention. And with the stats to back up the argument.

In India, it's not uncommon to be told something like, "Of course you'll remember the second day of the fourth Test at the Kotla in 2015, when Ravindra Jadeja took 5/30 and South Africa were bowled out for 121." If you do remember, well done. If you don't, it's best to nod and prepare to learn something.

Contrary to popular opinion, Indians are not interested only in Indian cricket. It's true that their stadiums fall as silent as a mortuary at midnight whenever a non-India player does anything well in matches against their teams. But it is just as true that 54,923 spectators - almost all of them Indians - showed up to watch New Zealand play South Africa at the Narendra Modi Stadium on Saturday, when there wasn't an India player in sight. You wouldn't be able to fit that many fans into any cricket venue in New Zealand or South Africa. And to think more than twice as many will likely be in the same place on Sunday to watch the South Africans take on India in a Super Eight showdown.

Indian cricket gets a bad rap because of the behaviour of the cricket board, and there is plenty of justification for that. But neither the broadcaster nor the board are Indian cricket, which is a credit to the world game. It is its busy mind, its beating heart, and an engine fuelled by nothing less than love. These people are steeped in cricket, not cupcakes.

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