Don't miss the ending

In a perfect world (meaning, game of cricket) every match goes down to the last ball. All results are possible, and in the mad scramble to victory, or defeat, there is delight, horror, humour and shame - like the Chappell brothers conspiring to roll New Zealand to defeat in 1981.

A couple of times a season I might be lucky enough to play in one of these thrilling last-ball finishes. My favourite ridiculous boyhood, and probably adulthood, fantasy is to be in the field with six runs required. As the batter seemingly lifts the ball over the boundary to glory I leap backwards, flexed like a springing salmon, catch the ball one-handed, before lobbing it back into play, balletically forward rolling and running on to the field to take the match-winning catch. Alas, such a daydream has not yet become a reality, although I did nearly clear out a row of deckchairs a few weeks ago when I dived from the field to try to tap a maximum back on to the pitch - instead, I bruised my palm and scared a couple of small children, and the six remained a six.

Less fantasy, but still occasionally ridiculous, is the very real drama from a final-ball finish at any level of cricket. That a game, lasting from 20 overs to five days, after all the twists and turns can be decided on the fate of a single delivery, is a remarkable climax.

The two tied Tests, Australia v West Indies in 1960, and India v Australia in 1986, exciting and nail-biting as they were, both went down to the penultimate ball so don't quite qualify for this last gasp finish that the two drawn Tests do. The first of these occurred between Zimbabwe and England in Bulawayo in 1996, when the hapless Nick Knight couldn't quite dash back for the third run required. Then there was another madcap run out when R Ashwin couldn't return for the vital second run in the 2011 Mumbai Test between India and West Indies.

Although the last-ball finish is rare in the five-day game, T20s and ODIs seem made for the spectacle. The fewer deliveries in a match, the more likely a result on the last ball.

While Chaminda Vaas had been the hero of Sri Lanka's last-ball win over Australia in the second ODI in Dambulla in 2004, drilling Andrew Symonds to the crease with a flurry of yorkers meaning the maximum needed to win off the final delivery never looked likely, his death-over duel with Shivnarine Chanderpaul against West Indies in Trinidad for the first ODI in 2008 was not the same fairy-tale finish. Where Vaas had subdued Symonds in 2004 with his flawless length, here he miscalculated by a few centimetres, turning his attempted last-ball yorker into a juicy full bunger that Chanderpaul flicked over Mahela Jayawardene at deep midwicket for the six needed for glory. Chanderpaul the hero, Vaas the victim. Despite the on-field invasion of celebrating West Indies players, along with gathering staff and security, Chanderpaul and Vaas manage to leave the field together - no surprise that Chanderpaul skips up the pavilion steps as Vaas trudges.

Still, apart from the infamous Chappell roll that so infuriated dear Richie Benaud, it's Javed Miandad's ultimate heave to victory in Sharjah in 1986 that is surely the superlative final-ball thriller.

The see-saw win-loss available in a last-ball finish can certainly be cruel. When victory for the team ahead seems most likely, the upset is all the more painful. Needing an impossible 12 from the last ball in a T20 game for Auckland against Northern Districts in Hamilton in 2007, bowler Graeme Aldridge, with no pressure on him whatsoever from a legal delivery, managed to bowl a chest-high full toss that was no-balled before the batsman Andre Adams slashed it for four. From mathematical impossibility to horribly real victory, Adams then belted the last ball for six and delighted in the most ridiculous of wins.

I may not have had the ignominy of walking off the pitch in front of thousands of fans, my head down after blowing it for my country, but I do know both sides of that last ball - from bowler and batsman. The pressure, whether running in to try to fire down that perfect yorker, or taking guard with one last swing of the bat to decide victory or defeat, is palpable. I remember my junior team needing one run off the final over and I was on strike. We had wickets in hand, but the bowler repeatedly hit the seam and each ball spat off a length - I never made contact with a single delivery, and only on the last ball did the keeper miss it too, and we scrabbled the single bye needed for the win. I nearly cried when I got back in the changing room.

Pressure does strange things to the human brain. Look at South Africa-Australia 1999 World Cup semi-final - and yes, I do know this wasn't quite a last-ball finish, but with nine runs needed off the last over, Lance Klusener hammering a first-ball four off Damien Fleming to start, followed by a scorching second-ball four through the covers, it's a remarkable example of how a team put themselves firmly in control of their own fate, and then failed.

After Allan Donald was nearly run out by Darren Lehmann backing up, the next-ball comedy was worthy of Charlie Chaplin himself. The game was won and lost with Klusener doing his best impersonation of a kamikaze pilot as he ran headlong down the wicket while Donald sprinted bat-less towards his own doom.

The last-ball finale is rare, and when it does happen we never forget the outcome, whether we're the ecstatic/dejected fan, the hapless clown with his hands on his head, or the jubilant player with his hands in the air. If only all games could end on the final delivery.