IT was a day of destiny for the magnificent Rose Bowl ground.

Hampshire Cricket chairman Rod Bransgrove has a vision to make it the leading one-day venue in England and on Saturday it played host to the first of five matches in the ICC Champions Trophy.

The majority of the record-breaking crowd of 11,871 were India fans making their first visit to England's newest international venue.

But while there was a wonderful carnival-like atmosphere for their match against Kenya, the verdict on The Rose Bowl was very simple: Lovely ground, but nightmare getting there.

With no wide-scale car-parking on site, supporters had been told to make use of a park-and-ride bus service from the Tesco superstore a few miles up the road.

But those who took that advice quickly wished they hadn't.

There were not enough buses to properly cope with the huge demand, leaving fans - often whole families - with the choice of several miles walking, several hours waiting or several quid for a taxi.

The result was that come the start of play at 10.15am, the ground was only about half-full.

Prakash Mehta brought a family of seven down from London for the day.

"We got to the park-and-ride at 9.15am," he said. "But we did not get into the ground until 12 noon which meant that we missed roughly 18 overs.

"There only seemed to be about four or five coaches and they clearly didn't take into consideration the number of people that would be coming here.

"It was chaos at Tesco with people jumping the queues and no real organisation. We also left the match early to avoid the rush. It has cost the family £300 and I don't feel that with all the difficulties getting to the ground we got value for money."

Manoj Tank, from Whitton, follows India all over the world and experienced similar problems getting to the ground.

But he was keen to stress that once they arrived 'The Rose Bowl experience' compared with absolutely anywhere in the world. He said: "They must learn from the problems for next time and they could really have delayed the game.

"But it is one of the best grounds I have been to. The setting is fantastic and the atmosphere was fantastic."

The superbly passionate Indian fans were in full voice throughout, but there was also a reasonable contingent supporting Kenya.

Parminder Mongat lives in London and said: "It was a nightmare getting here, but it is a great venue. If they can get the organisation sorted out, I hope they stage many more internationals."

Yet for all the gripes about the transport, it was impossible not to become quickly intoxicated by a truly amazing atmosphere. The horns, the whistles, the drums, the flags and the Mexican waves were constant throughout, while every Indian boundary was greeted with a roar to rival any Saints goal at St Mary's.

As a venue, The Rose Bowl has much less of the stuffy feel associated with many of the other international locations in England.

Bransgrove's exciting vision is certainly realisable and The Rose Bowl definitely has the potential to become a real 'people's ground' for the big occasions.

But the message from Saturday was very clear. For that to happen, there are issues surrounding the infrastructure outside the venue which do still need to be resolved.