Tariq Ahmed loiters around a forlorn lane which connects the Khettarama Temple Road to the Premadasa Stadium in the city’s bustling commercial district.

Inside the ground, a few Pakistan players are going through the drills before a nets session under lights on Friday. The soft-spoken Tariq has travelled from Toronto just
to get a feel of the India- Pakistan rivalry in a World Cup encounter.

The fickle T20 format doesn’t make a difference since it is the very essence of the duel which unfolds high drama in the minds, be it the refusal to shake hands or the players not seeing eye to eye post Operation Sindoor.

Tariq has saved enough to afford this “luxury”, but has to sit out since spectators aren’t allowed a sneak peek of the players ahead of the match.

A few yards away, a group of Indians keenly wait to catch a glimpse of Suryakumar Yadav and Jasprit Bumrah only to return disappointed on learning that their chartered flight from New Delhi will land only late in the evening.

Piyush Sharma is in a group of five from Noida who are still searching for two additional tickets to meet their demands since the official website hasn’t yet put up the ‘Sold Out’ notification. The International Cricket Council are releasing tickets in batches for high-octane contests and hence there is renewed hope in their minds.

The Indian fans will outnumber their Pakistani counterparts by several thousands on Sunday even as the hunt for tickets has spread across several social media platforms. Telegram channels, besides Facebook and WhatsApp groups, have been buzzing since early this week and, surprisingly, have yielded positive results.

The flights to Colombo are packed with people ready to pay absurd airfares, while star hotel tariffs across Galle Face Centre Road have skyrocketed to nearly ₹1 lakh in Indian currency (LKR 340,000). That too within a few hours after the ICC and the Pakistan Cricket Board officially confirmed the status of the match.

Colombo’s Bandaranaike International Airport will perhaps witness a record surge in chartered flights of celebrities and business tycoons who will jet set across continents just to be under the arc lights on Sunday evening.

Cricket officialdom, too, will be present in full force, be it the ICC, PCB or the BCCI. Jay Shah or Mohsin Naqvi could be within handshaking distance, as also Devajit Saikia and Rajeev Shukla with their PCB counterparts. Aminul Islam Bulbul, president of
the Bangladesh Cricket Board, has already confirmed his presence in the high-voltage clash.

Colombo’s bars and cafes are already buzzing with nervous excitement, humming with the clamour of the tuktuks and unending cricket chatter. The city’s vibrant nightspots have suddenly sprung back to life, ready to bask in the glory of the ‘greatest rivalry’ in cricket.

The fixture is known to be worth close to $200 million, over 20 per cent of the overall ICC revenue, media rights and gate receipts included from the tournament.

No wonder Sri Lanka President Anura Kumara Dissanayake publicly thanked Pakistan Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif once the standoff was resolved through negotiations. Sri Lanka, still recovering from the 2022 economic meltdown, needed this celebrated fixture to lift its revenue, tourism and reputation.