With the new, mind-bogglingly lucrative Twenty20 cricket competition beginning on Friday it was the perfect scenario: so desperate is the public to attend the first match between Bangalore Royal Challengers and Kolkata Knight Riders that they are prepared to scuffle

It seems that they ire of the mob was stoked by a long wait in the afternoon sun when suddenly the ticket office was closed. According to reports some members of the queue stormed the counter and broke cash registers and furniture. They were annoyed because of the lack of information, the agent provocateur of queues and mobs everywhere.

The incident has had the effect of imbuing the IPL - just at the right time - with the essence of a must see event. It is all over the papers and on emerging from Bangalore Airport the first thing that strikes - apart from the usual melee of taxi drivers anxious to provide their services, which may be another example of a mob - is the massive poster covering a wall to the left.

It features, in meaningfully dramatic pose, some of the Challengers' key players, led by their captain, the great India batsman, Rahul Dravid. There is no doubt that the IPL is being promoted, marketed and generally shoved down the public throats and before their eyes. With the millions of dollars lavished on players’ salaries alone - there is no option.

But the truth is that nobody really knows if it going to work. A lot think they know and as many more hope they know but not until Friday in the M Chinnaswamy Stadium will anybody have a proper idea. Which is why mob rule was just what the spin doctors ordered.