OAKLAND — Cricket brings together people from all over the world and all walks of life.

An Indian, an Indian-American, an Australian, and an Englishman all traveled together from the Central Valley on Thursday to watch Major League Cricket’s first-ever match at the Oakland Coliseum.

Thousands of fans joined them — precise attendance figures were not immediately available — waving San Francisco Unicorns flags and sporting the home team’s orange color. And they were treated to a show, as players from San Francisco and the Washington Freedom inspired the crowd with a parade of sixes — the cricket equivalent of home runs.

And they sported banana costumes, an apparel choice they saw while watching international cricket on television. Their enthusiasm matched their spirited choice of attire.

“We watch a lot of test cricket, like England versus Australia, a lot of international teams, and we always see guys in the crowd wearing a banana outfit,” said Jasprit Buhmra, a native of India who now lives in Fresno. “And we’re like, ‘You know what? Why not be those guys?’ So we’re like, ‘Yeah, we’ll come here. We’ll be those guys.’ Have a good time, get the crowd going.”

The Unicorns gave the fans a lot to stand up and cheer about early on. Batting first, they unleashed six after six during a prolific batting campaign that resulted in 269 runs Thursday evening as this newspaper went to press.

This gave Daniel Buny, a fellow banana-clad fan and friend of Buhmra’s, great pleasure. The two had a side bet on the game.

Buny was all in on the Unicorns, while Buhmra had bet on the Freedom.

How much?

“Too much,” Buhmra said while watching San Francisco rip six after six.

They brought along their friend AJ Singh, an Indian-American and cricket novice who grew up in Turlock and was a fan of the Raiders and A’s.

“I just never grew up around it,” Singh said of cricket. “I’ll be honest, I grew up around soccer and baseball. That’s pretty much it, those two sports I played. And they asked me, ‘Hey, you want to check out a cricket game at the Coliseum?’ So I figured, why not? Give it a shot, see what it’s about.”

The foursome started up a cricket game in the parking lot before the game and got some kids involved while tailgating.

The late-arriving crowd then moved into the stadium. While the attendance seemed sparse amid the 63,000-seat capacity of the Coliseum, the fans who made it to San Francisco’s first home match brought the noise to a venue that has been missing major league sports since the A’s departure in September.

“It’s very important,” Singh said. “Because the people of Oakland, they need something. The Warriors are gone. Raiders are gone. So it’s just a sad situation.”

“Oakland has such a great history of sports,” Buhmra added. “Honestly, keeping sport in Oakland is so important. I mean, the culture here is so unbelievable. The arena is so beautiful. For them to be able to convert it into a cricket pitch, soccer, to be able to do what they do, is so important.”

For Bobby Bent, a native of Australia, cricket is a way of life, and one that he was excited the fans in Oakland got to experience on Thursday night.

“It’s in my blood,” Bent said. “In Australia, I mean, it’s mandatory for everyone to at least try out cricket. Everyone’s touched a bat, touched a ball. But it was a huge surprise for me to come all the way here to the States and have an atmosphere that’s very similar. I feel right at home right now. I really can’t complain. It can’t get much better than this.

“This is our first time with my mates here as well that I met from this country. So it’s just awesome, man.”