Life for Sourav Ganguly fans fell 15 runs short of being a fairy tale on Friday. As Sourav edged Jason Krejza to slip and started the long walk back in Nagpur, 971km away a city held its breath.

So near, yet so far. Over 220 minutes at the Vidarbha Cricket Association Stadium, Sourav had given fans the dream of a fairy-tale end to a career that had got off to a fairy-tale start in June 1996 at Lords.

It ended in a flash at 85. Nowhere was the mood more sombre than back in Behala. “What a fairy tale it would have been — hundred on debut, a hundred matches and a hundred in his last Test,” elder brother Snehasish Ganguly told Metro. “But what is most upsetting is the fact that he is retiring when he is in such prime form. If only he had been allowed to bat freely without all that off-field tension, he could have easily served the country for another year.”

Ratan Halder, who lives not far from the Biren Roy Road residence of Calcutta’s biggest sporting hero, was also suffering from the bow-out blues. “Is this the last time we saw Sourav bat for India?” he wondered. “If he had got the 100 and it turned out to be his last Test innings he would have matched Greg Chappell in scoring a century in the first and last innings. That would have been such a fitting finale.”

Some residents of the area have constructed a miniature cricket field by spray-painting husk, put up posters like advertisement boards in a cricket stadium and are playing Kabhi alvida naa kehna in the background. The common cry? Sourav don’t go.

“To mark his last match, we are here all five days expressing our support,” said Angie Ngoba, a management student and a die-hard member of the Sourav fan club. “I still cannot believe we will see Team India without Sourav,” added the girl from Shillong.

Many in Sourav’s para are crestfallen for more reasons than one. “CAS was implemented in Behala two years ago but many of us cannot afford a set-top box needed to watch channels like Neo Cricket. So, we have missed Sourav’s last series,” rued 16-year-old Souvik Majumdar.