The pink-ball Test between India and England marked a new beginning of the Motera Stadium which was renamed as the Narendra Modi Stadium. While the stage was set for a massive start in the presence of fans, the stadium had one moment of shame when the LED lights of the stadium went off for a minute.
Cricket returned to Ahmedabad after a gap of six years as the Narendra Modi stadium was rebuilt to make it the largest cricket stadium in the world which can fill 1.3 lakhs fans. Spread over 63 acres of land, it cost the administration a whopping sum of ₹800 crores.
Play halts at Narendra Modi Stadium
Meanwhile, the incident took place in the Indian innings’ second over and just before Shubman Gill was seemingly caught in slips but recalled after the replays showed that Ben Stokes had grassed the ball. The England camp expressed displeasure over ruling out the catch and skipper Joe Root was even seen having an animated chat with the umpire.
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The LED lights at the Narendra Modi stadium are unique as all the other stadia in India had floodlights on towers. Here the lights are on the rim of the roof that covers the stands. It is meant to avoid the shadow of the players. However, this is not the first time, lights have gone off in a cricket match.
Previously, the Eden Gardens in Kolkata has witnessed floodlights going off on multiple occasions. Back in 2009, the India-Sri Lanka ODI was affected by it with the lights going off for 26 minutes. A 2016 World T20 game between New Zealand and Bangladesh too was affected as lights went off for about 15 minutes.
Speaking about the game, India trail by 13 runs in the first innings after bowling out England for 112 runs thanks to Axar Patel’s six-wicket haul. India went back at the end of the first day’s play at 99 runs with Rohit Sharma and Ajinkya Rahane in the middle. Rohit is unbeaten at 57 runs and is all set for another brilliant century.