The Panesar Army are coming

Enigmatic England spinner Panesar will not be short on crowd support when he takes the field in Mohali.

Enigmatic England spinner Monty Panesar will not be short on crowd support when he takes the field in the second cricket Test against India starting on Thursday.

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Leading the cheering squad for the first Sikh ever to play for England would be none other than his grandparents who would be travelling all the way from Ludhiana to watch the 'Punjab da puttar' (Punjab's son) in action.

Hari Singh and Manjit Kaur have been provided special seating position in President's box, courtesy the Punjab Cricket Association.

"We are really excited about making the trip to Mohali. We take a lot of pride in Monty's performance," 78-year-old Hari Singh said.

Hari Singh said since they missed Monty's first Test wicket -- a sensational dismissal of Sachin Tendulkar -- because of a power cut in their area and that this time they did not want to take a chance.

The septuagenarian couple would not be alone in cheering Panesar, though.

A few hundreds of fans from Panesar's ancestral village in Ludhiana district would be at the venue to cheer the 23-year old Luton-born.

The Panesar Fan Club alone should outnumber the Barmy Army.

And it seems to matter little for the PFC members that every time they would be cheering a success for their bandana-sporting he, it would be a setback for India!