A Chhatrapati kicked it off. Messi and Ronaldo rule Kolhapur now
The city of Kolhapur in India has developed a unique football culture, featuring massive cutouts of global stars like Messi and Ronaldo. This passion for the sport is rooted in historical royal patronage and influence from Polish refugees during World War II.
Why it matters
It illustrates the cultural diversity of sports fandom in India, contrasting the country's dominant cricket culture with localized football enthusiasm.
It’s left now to Argentina and Spain to fight it out for the football’s greatest prize, the rest have all bowed out of the game’s biggest stage. But in Kolhapur, Portuguese star Cristiano Ronaldo still watches over a traffic junction, and Brazil’s talisman Neymar Jr towers above a neighbourhood awash in yellow and green. Lionel Messi is there, too, presiding over a busy crossroads.The city of the Mahalakshmi Temple in central Maharashtra chooses a different set of gods for the football World Cup. Made of iron frames and printed flex, they rise 45ft above roads and markets. Between 12 and 16 of these giants dot Kolhapur’s skyline — an improbable sight in a country that lives and breathes cricket. “The posters announce that Kolhapur is football-crazy in a cricketcrazy nation,” says Vikas Patil, a former player.
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