The Surfer

What is 'just' about telling every other cricketing nation outside your protected elite that they are not welcome at the game's biggest global gathering? The ICC have cancelled the 2015 World Cup. No tournament that denies an entry route to all but the select few has the right to that title.

The World Cup has two main problems: it's too long, and has too many meaningless matches. Simply reducing the teams solves neither. You could increase the number of competing teams to 16 and polish off a neat 31-game tournament with at worst a handful of dead rubbers through four groups of four, followed by knockouts from the quarter-finals onwards. But in the 2015 ICC Invitational, the 10 teams will play each other in a round-robin first stage followed by semi-finals and a final. That equals 48 games. The World Cup just finished had 49 games.

By nine in the evening, it is clear that India is ‘going’—to the World Cup finals, that is. In a houseboat on Dal Lake, with Tariq and Raees for company, I watch Manmohan Singh, Yousuf Raza Gilani next to him, usher an Indian win with awkward applause. I understand his situation. I am quiet. Srinagar falls silent. No one acts “funny”.

It’s fascinating how the cricket lives of most in this team have run parallel with Tendulkar’s international career. Ten members of this squad, and most of them forming the core, are between 27 and 32. Many of them were drawn to cricket because of Tendulkar and many have talked about idolizing him in their impressionable years. Many tried to bat like him before getting more realistic. A few initially picked up heavy bats – the kind that he uses – before exchanging them for lighter ones.

Sehwag finally found some form. Ponting bowled his spinners to complete the 25 overs soon for there was a threat of rain. The move backfired. Sehwag launched Brad Hogg out of the park for a couple of sixes. Someone did the wise thing of bursting firecrackers then, for it was the only time we even had an outside chance of winning the match. It left a deep scar on us. We couldn’t even talk ourselves up. We could have hated Australia, but we didn’t want to. They were clearly superior.

We can leave it there, with all the responsibility lying on Cricket Canada’s shoulders, but that will not work. Their role is to lead and support; the game will go nowhere without the interest and effort of those labouring in the trenches across the country. This summer we need to play cricket in the public eye- invite reporters, politicians, friends, and most importantly kids. Hold clinics, fun days to introduce anyone who is interested to the game. Develop recreational cricket where ability and wining are irrelevant. Start a women’s team, and develop a youth system. Move away from traditional club patterns built on ethnic origin – be inclusive, not exclusive. Get into your local schools. Cricket perhaps will never be a mainstream sport in Canada – but it can be a highly successful minor sport in every city in the country.

In the critical hour and despite modest returns, Dhoni dared to back himself. That is leading from the front. Even in the toughest times, too, he managed to convey composure. Throughout, his players felt their captain remained on the bridge and the situation was under control.

It might have been different had Nuwan Kulasekera not dropped Gambhir when he was on 30, after misjudging a catch at long off, but once Dhoni strode purposefully to the crease and began to hit the ball with such decisive power and purpose, you sensed it was always going to be India’s night.

The calm with which this team approaches challenges is the key to success. You'd never feel we are flustered or rushed. This self-belief has developed over the years after being through the lows a number of times.

At times when you are close to the pinnacle, subconsciously you reach there even before you are actually there. The same happened to me. I reached the hundred before I got there, was imagining myself raising the bat and lost focus. But now who cares? We are the world champions.

This was an achievement worthy of a place in anyone's pantheon of sport, a place which is never accommodating to anything remotely resembling a cheap victory.

Watching his unbeaten century was indeed a humbling experience for those of us most reluctant to acknowledge there is much chance of anything truly memorable occurring in any of the shortened forms of a great game. Jayawardene did not flail against this prejudice. He simply caressed it to death.

The recipe is simple. Mix the John Wright coaching regime with a group of open-minded, tenacious players and an attitude of controlled aggression. That is the simplest way to return New Zealand to another successful cricketing era.

The evidence is stark. A team that could win just one ODI out of 12 on the sub-continent towards the end of last year have made the semi-finals of the World Cup, lining up with "the locals" - Sri Lanka, India and Pakistan.