MS Dhoni's last match as Indian captain to have free entry for fans

There is some great news for the fans in Mumbai at the moment. The Cricket Club of India (CCI) has announced free entry for the fans in the first warm-up match between India A and England. As per the reports in ESPNcricinfo, one of the CCI officials confirmed the same. The north and the east stands of the stadium will be open for the fans to witness MS Dhoni take charge as the Indian captain for the last time. The west stand is under renovation and hence will remain closed during the game.

The officials also informed that the if the stadium gets filled by 3 pm, the gates will be closed then. The match starts at 1:30 pm on January 10. The decision to allow free entry for the fans has come a day after there was confusion about the status of the entry for the warm-up encounter. Various reports suggested that the Mumbai Police demanded close to INR 60 lakh for providing the security. The CCI had subsequently redirected the demand to the BCCI.

The police anticipated huge crowd with the match being MS Dhoni’s last game as Indian captain. The BCCI, on hearing the heavy demand from the police, had then asked CCI to restrict the entry to only the officials and the CCI members if the police do not lower their charge. After a closed-door meeting between the CCI, the BCCI and the police department, a negotiation was reached wherein it is estimated that the police department lowered their demands.

“There were only 40 policepersons who were set to be deployed initially. There are normally hardly 200-300 people for warm-up matches, but with Dhoni playing his last match as a captain, the game has become high-profile. So, more police personnel will have to be deployed; there will be around 300 policepersons now,” said the CCI official.

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“The CCI gets only a grant of Rs 1 lakh per game from the BCCI and our expenses are generally reimbursed by the board. Even in this issue, the police dealt directly with the BCCI,” the official added.

Whatever be the discussion between the officials, the fans have received a big bonus in the form of free entry. Dhoni will take charge as the Indian captain for one last time after having stepped down from the coveted post recently.