The Cup of Life

As the Cricket World Cup 2011 draws to its business end, I sit up to do something I've been wanting to do for quite a while now! I've been more motivated by a laziness to not blog of late, and hence, the frequency of posts has dwindled considerably, but nevertheless, this is something I cannot hold myself from blogging about.

In my opinion, the World Cup 2011 has been by far the most entertaining of world cups I've been a witness to in the history of me watching the world cup. Well, I'm not sure if it is as interesting as how 1996 was, but sadly the three world cups which I've been following prior to this, it has been way too irritating to see the World Cup head down the same damned direction. For once, the World Cup seems open to all right now, irrespective of Aussies being the only unbeaten team in the World Cup this time too, at the point of me writing this post. The last thing I want to see is Ricky Ponting lifting another of those cups, well, the image has got so boringly stuck to my mind.

I also think, when you can actually relate to an audience, to a set of spectators, it makes the viewing experience all the more enjoyable. The fact that the World Cup is in India is testimony to the enjoyment the World Cup has been providing me. The fate of a few teams have been extremely oscillatory so far in the Cup. No one exemplifies this better than the English do. But as Andy Zaltsman rightly said after the last league game of the English team, they played 6 matches, ended with 3 wins, 1 tie and 2 losses. But no one is really complaining because the way their matches were headed, they could have ended up with anywhere between 6 losses and 6 wins! India on the other hand have been very patchy. The bowling has not yet turned up at the World Cup. It's high time India did something so as to get back on track. The West Indies, Pakistan and New Zealand have been metamorphoses. Pakistan, surprising as ever, have thrown their group wide open after running Sri Lanka down. It only helps them by leaps and bounds that their captain is in such terrific form. The Windies are another bunch of surprising cricketers, thulped Bangladesh and the associate teams, while they haven't really as yet turned up against the big teams. But New Zealand steals the cake, as after all the pre-World Cup failure, they've come out really big, and their demolition of Pakistan said a huge story, of what it is to fight against all odds.

So, the world cup seems to all poised for a real good finish. It looks like for the first time since 1996, the best 8 teams will face off in the knock-out stages, and so each of the 7 matches that follow the group stages, I expect to be a delight! So, let's have fun watching and hoping that India can do it for that old/young man who has been single-handedly ferrying India's cricketing hope for so long!