An airport runway is visible on the horizon from the BCCI's Centre of Excellence. The sounds of planes taking off do not reach the ground, but the sights do. For much of Delhi's innings - batting first after being put in by Gujarat - Rishabh Pant was ready to take off himself. But he stayed grounded, having walked in at 98 for 3 in the 20th over.
On the outskirts of Bengaluru, in the absence of big crowds or traffic, the tempo of the game is punctuated by the sounds in the middle: taps of the bat as the bowler runs in, fielders upping the decibels for an appeal, groans after a bouncer whizzes past the batter.
The pitch offered a bit of zip and carry for the faster bowlers who made life more difficult for batters than when Virat Kohli had raced away to a 29-ball half-century. He had scored 77 of Delhi's 108 runs by the time he was stumped by a superb bit of left-arm spin bowling from Vishal Jayswal.
With the field spread, and Delhi at the risk of running out of batters, survival was key as Pant got stuck in with no release in sight. He mostly tucked deliveries past the in-fielders to accumulate singles to get into the 20s and then his 30s.
Pant focused on crease occupation and largely avoided flamboyant, aerial shots early on. His stillness at the crease was at odds with the power loading up each time he tapped his bat on the pitch; his conservative stroke play at odds with the power he still channelled into them. Another tuck across the field took him to 49.
Then he flicked a switch as he saw Ravi Bishnoi bowl a wrong'un away from his hitting arc - latching onto it with a brutal swing across the line. His hand did not quite come off his bat, as it does with many of his powerful shots, but the ball was launched deep beyond the long-on boundary.
The spring had been wound for long enough, and now past 50, something changed in the tempo of his movements in between deliveries: he suddenly seemed to jump across the crease, more eager to tap gloves with Harsh Tyagi at the other end.
Soon after his fifty, there he was down on his knees, sweeping past deep-backward square leg, even as he almost fell over to the other side. He had reached his half-century off 62 balls. He added 20 off his next 16. The best shot of this set of runs was when he stood deep in his crease and a ball rose awkwardly, shooting up from just short of a good length outside off. He swivelled his bat, the arc of his follow-through mimicking a helicopter shot. The result was a ball that seemed destined to cramp him up racing to the cover boundary.
Pant's last ODI for India was more than a year ago - against Sri Lanka in August 2024 - but he is on the periphery of India's white-ball plans. The common perception is that while his high-risk, high-reward strategy suits Test cricket, he has not been able to find a tempo for himself when he has to navigate a limited number of overs.
The numbers back up this perception. He has scored only one century in 31 ODIs and has an average of 33.50. His List A figures do not read much different.
By the time Pant was dismissed for 70, Delhi's resurgence was over, before Pant's own knock could reach its crescendo: a long-running symptom of how he paces his one-day innings. Delhi lost wickets in a clump at the death, finishing on 254 for 9, when it looked like they could have got much more.
But Pant has a great opportunity to build a way back into form and a new run-scoring template, just like fellow batter-keeper Ishan Kishan did during the Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy.