If by a miracle, all vehicles on the roads around this mega city’s maidans stop in unison, drivers avoid pressing those blaring horns, and vendors stay mum, the resultant silence will be punctured by the sound of a million red cherries thudding into eager bats.
Cricket is all pervading in Mumbai and at the Wankhede Stadium with its various hat-tips to great cricketers, the latest being a Sachin Tendulkar statue, India will take on Sri Lanka in a World Cup game on Thursday. The Men in Blue are on a roll. Most opposition teams have been accounted for and after the duel involving Sri Lanka, there will be the looming presence of South Africa at Kolkata’s Eden Gardens this Sunday. Much later the Netherlands will await India at Bengaluru and by then hopefully India’s semifinal rival would become evident.
Cut to the here and now, Sri Lanka, the 1996 champion, and at one stage perennial finalists, has lost its way. The rebuilding phase after the retirements of various stalwarts has been an extended journey. In the present campaign, Kusal Mendis and his men notched victories over England and the Netherlands. However, losses against South Africa, Pakistan, Australia and Afghanistan have left the neighbours from across the Palk Strait rowing a leaky boat on rough seas.
