As Lucknow's disappointed fanbase left the Ekana Cricket Stadium on Wednesday following the abandonment of the T20I between India and South Africa, a man in his late 30s looked more vexed than most. Boarding a shared auto-rickshaw ride, he poured out his reason for being stressed.

"Aaj ghar jaakar bahut daant padni hai biwi aur bachchon se. Do hazaar rupaye barbaad ho gaye (My wife and kids are going to scold me. I wasted two thousand rupees on this match ticket)," he said.

As his fellow riders tried to calm him down, explaining that the money would be refunded since not a single delivery was bowled, the man countered, "I had to buy this ticket in black from a stranger. There were no tickets available. I won't get a penny in return."

It wasn't just the money that he had to squeeze through his limited savings. He had skipped a day at work and travelled nearly 700 kms (one way) from Machi Talab in Munger, Bihar to watch the match.

It would be easy to put a lens of judgment on this wild decision to watch a meaningless T20I under such constrained and difficult circumstances. But it isn't uncommon to witness such crazy passion for the sport in the country. It has existed for decades, just like the menace of match tickets being sold on the black market.

Was it a crime of love, circumstances or personal choices that an Indian cricket fan bought a match ticket from the black market at INR 2000, travelled more than 1300 km to sit in the stands for four hours breathing 'hazardous' air, and did not get to watch a single ball?

Perhaps rather than judging this kind of passion, would it not be more constructive to ask how it can be better supported, given that it is ultimately what fuels the country's biggest sport, making a favourite past time into a national industry that provides a livelihood to players, coaches, admin staff, event coordinators, and to those who make decisions on how the game is governed?

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On Wednesday evening, as a dense cloud of fog settled around the stadium and blurred parts of the stands at the opposite end, it was obvious that a cricket match was unlikely to happen. To provide some entertainment to the half-full stadium, the DJ sprung to action and kickstarted what turned out to be a DJ-night with the popular Bollywood chartbuster 'London Thumakda', from the movie Queen. The line 'dikhta hai sab kuch clear maahiya tere saamne (everything seems clear in front of you)' seemed ironic for the moment.

Soon enough, India's players ended their warm-up routines and left the field. Silent visuals of Hardik Pandya wearing a mask to counter the air quality index (AQI) of 490 offered the required explanation.

The conditions were clearly unfeasible for a game of cricket, or grooving to the DJ's music, or probably even to sit in the open air. Yet when the last inspection took place around 9.25pm and the match was called off, more than half the stadium was still full. After all, international men's cricket had come to Lucknow for the first time in more than two years.

That the match in Lucknow was abandoned due to 'excessive fog' came as no surprise, even if it had not previously happened to an international cricket game in India. For nearly a decade now, domestic matches in north India have been impacted by fog, especially in late December and early January.

The most logical question then is: why were three out of the five matches in the series scheduled in north India, when it has been clear for a decade that air quality is problematic in the region at this time of year?

The most honest answer, in some ways, came through the exchange between the BCCI vice-president Rajiv Shukla and fellow Congressman Shashi Tharoor outside the Indian parliament in New Delhi on Thursday: rotation policy. It's a part of the unofficial, unwritten agreement between the board and the state associations that keeps such a vast network of Indian cricket from cracking.

In a tropical country like India, which hosts more than 200 domestic games, two T20 leagues and more than 30 international games (in a non-World Cup year), venue allotment is anyway a complex process. Monsoons hamper the south western regions from June to September, and then the south eastern belt for a couple of months thereafter. December and January become challenging for north India, and the summer months are reserved for IPL - while being equally unreasonable for any form of day-cricket.

In all this complexity, the BCCI also has to factor in cultural events like big festivities in different regions, which keep the police forces busy. There are logistical limitations as well. For example, the Super League of the recently-concluded Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy had to be moved from Indore to Pune, due to non-availability of hotel rooms in the wedding season coupled with a major medical conference.

And by the end of all that, they have to ensure that pitches remain fresh for all high-profile matches (such as internationals, leagues, World Cups, senior domestic finals).

Cricket has not been played in front of crowds at Bengaluru's M Chinnaswamy Stadium following the stampede earlier this year, while Chennai's Chepauk is undergoing renovation. Mumbai's DY Patil is set to host the Women's Premier League early next year, while Baroda's BCA stadium will host WPL games as well as an ODI against New Zealand. Fresh pitches needed!

Rajkot, Nagpur, Guwahati, Visakhapatnam, Thiruvananthapuram, Raipur and Indore are all scheduled to host international men's cricket next month. Delhi, Kolkata and Mumbai's Wankhede Stadium are scheduled to host the men's T20 World Cup games in February and March.

With every association with an international stadium (except Hyderabad) in east, west, south and central zones appeased - from Cuttack's old Barabati Stadium to New Chandigarh hosting games - if the 'rotation policy' is to be followed, where else could the games against South Africa have gone if not north India?

If the onus is to not be too heavy on the rotation policy itself, despite all the constraints, there are ways to manage the situation, at least for international cricket. The BCCI still employs a manual process to allot games, far different from the advanced computerised system that's in place in the Premier League to ease the complex scheduling process for football in England.

To be fair, the Indian cricket board does a reasonable job - even if not perfect - to ensure the functioning of over 2000 domestic games every season. The vast land mass of the country requires state associations to step in with their inputs on the local factors that could impact the game. In some ways, even if it wasn't obvious to the board itself, it's also a reminder that three associations in north India were convinced that they could pull off an international match under lights. Two of them (fortunately) could.

Could a T20I match in Mumbai's Wankhede Stadium - which will host the World Cup, just like Ahmedabad's Narendra Modi Stadium - be too much stress on the pitches? Or will an additional game in Thiruvananthapuram, like Tharoor suggested, be too much appeasement for one association over the other?

Will that mean only fans in a few specific regions can attend live games, as some administrators argue?

Last year, Indian men played 16 matches across 14 venues. Similarly, this year, they played 19 matches across 15 venues. On the other hand, here's the breakup of women's matches across the last five years in India:

2021 - 8 matches in 1 venue

2022 - 5 matches in 2 venues

2023 - 7 matches in 2 venues

2024 - 20 matches in 6 venues

2025 - 26 matches in 7 venues

That limited exposure hasn't hindered the growth in popularity of women's cricket in the country. This is largely because Indian cricket has flourished as a television (now internet) sport. The broadcasters have poured in big money, and made cricket accessible to millions.

For the common folks, watching Indian cricket - especially men's internationals or IPL - from the stadium has been an exercise in endurance for a while anyway. Several international stadiums, especially the ones built in the last decade, are outside city limits, making accessibility a challenge. The ticket prices are steep, and getting affordable tickets are often out of bounds. Once inside, access to water and reasonably-priced food and clean seats and washrooms are a challenge, if they are available at all.

Problems are plenty, but so are the solutions. When fans are established as the primary stakeholders of the sport, maybe the solutions too might be sought differently.

The administrative ingenuity has worked well to keep the vast network of Indian cricket largely smooth and functional, even if a bit chaotic at times. Unfortunately, it has often come at the cost of the comfort of cricket fans. But for many, that long travel, that expensive ticket, the high AQI - none of that matters. For them, cricket is beyond all that, almost sacrosanct. This near-unhealthy passion has often driven people beyond their means and comforts to turn up for these cricket games, ensuring the demand for tickets far outweighs its supply.

It would be unwise for the BCCI to take this for granted though. Any business who treats its customers like second-class citizens, rather than equal partners upon whom it is fortunate to depend, can expect some troubles once that customer base wakes up to the reality of the arrangement.

Hopefully, the abandoned match in Lucknow has offered the BCCI a reminder of this, unearthing the uncomfortable truths that are often suppressed in the big glamour and love for the sport itself.

The next five months of cricketing action - a season of WPL, a T20 World Cup and a season of IPL - has enough power in it to crush the nothingness of Lucknow. But hopefully, there will be some fixes that show the BCCI is paying attention, and wants to treat its fans more respectfully.

The words of assurance came from Shukla when he offered a simple response to Tharoor's much-agitated argument in politicising the issue of the fog-abandoned game. "Aage se dhyaan rakhenge (We will ensure this doesn't repeat in the future)".