Times of India: Chennai cheer
There was something very, very unusual about the group stage finale of the Asian Champions Trophy. India was playing Pakistan, in India. This has become a lost sight as official relations between the two countries have grown hostile. But on Wednesday, the packed crowd in the Chennai stadium was there to watch the hockey, not practise geopolitics. Sure, it supported the Indian team during the match itself. But it was welcoming to the visitors too, coming up in a huge round of applause after their national anthem. Athletes are pawns to various geopolitical faceoffs, but the Chennai crowd reminded everybody that this is not sporting at all.
Recent months have also seen the Pakistan football team play India in Bengaluru and an Indian contingent participate in a bridge championship in Lahore. And there is the most-anticipated match coming up, with the two countries’ cricket teams scheduled to play each other in Ahmedabad for the World Cup. An intense cricket rivalry is part and parcel of intense fandoms on both sides of the border. It is full of joy.
When sportspersons are made to pay the price of what some feral military generals or governments do, fans suffer alongside. Let the games carry on, is a much fairer policy. As the International Olympic Committee president has said, athletes should not be tarnished for acts of their government. On this principle, Russian athletes should be allowed to participate in the Paris Games and carry their own flag. If the US had boycotted the 1936 Berlin Games as some say it should have, history would be missing an extraordinary Jesse Owens chapter. Sports excellence represents a very inspirational and unifying kind of human flourishing. Making it less, lessens us all.