Hardik Pandya is Chaudhary, Rohit Sharma ‘Purana Chaudhary’ and MS Dhoni ‘Sarpanchon ka sarpanch’. A misfield gets compared to the mini-crisis of livestock stepping into water — ‘gayi bhains paani mai’. A six in the stands is a ‘ghana kasuta (very good)’ shot. It’s the Indian Premier League’s biggest face-off, Mumbai Indians is playing Chennai Super Kings at Wankhede but it gives the feel of watching cricket with locals at Lahli in Haryana.
After the grand success of Bhojpuri commentary, IPL broadcaster Jio Cinema has now added Haryanvi to its regional language bouquet that has Tamil, Kannada, Telugu, Malayalam, Punjabi, Marathi, and Bengali. Early trends show that India’s most sporting state is lapping up the latest innovation.
Two former Haryana players Manvindra Bisla and Sonu Sharma have joined Indian cricket’s original Chaudhary – Virender Sehwag.
Siddharth Sharma, Jio Cinema’s Head of Content, talks about a dedicated fan base tuning in when experts call the game in their mother tongue.“Sehwag speaking in Haryanvi… not many people would have seen him do that. It is the same when Zaheer Khan speaks Marathi. It is a testament to the consumption of regional commentary and that is what is making us expand our horizon,” Sharma said.
He also goes on to talk about the strategy. “India is a sum of parts and as a network we believe that we have the ability to reach a wider audience, if we are able to reach them and tell stories in their language. It is important for us to create that relatability. For the largest time, we all looked at English and thought that was the only way to watch and consume cricket,” Sharma said.
He also goes on to explain how each language provides a different flavour. “The Tamil commentary has cricket at its core. The fans in those regions are purists of the game. Bhojpuri language is mostly associated with cinema music. There are movie stars in the commentary team,” he added.
After offering multiple camera viewing experience during the 2022 FIFA World Cup, Jio Cinema added similar features to their IPL coverage last year. Apart from the conventional view, there is a 360 degree view, batter’s view, multi-camera view, stump view, birds-eye. This season, Jio Cinema has introduced the ‘hero cam’, where for every match a player from each team is picked and the camera follows what they do.
Hero cams
For instance, during Chennai Super Kings’ match against Delhi Capitals, the Hero cams were following MS Dhoni and Rishabh Pant. “We have the game going on in a window. Because when you are watching it in isolation, you won’t know why your hero is reacting in a certain way. With the game in the window, you will know the reason behind it. There is a dug-out view as well. People are preferring these varieties. For example, in the first three days, we surpassed last season’s tally for the number of people who preferred watching it from a multi-camera angle,” Sharma added.
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