Sometimes an early defeat in a World Cup can be a blessing. It rids the team of complacency, it focuses attention on weaknesses that might have been covered up by victory, it re-motivates the players, it shines a light on team selection since non-performers have no place to hide. Australia, who began with two defeats at this World Cup now look like one of the favourites.
It can go the other way too. Champions England are at the bottom of the table two-thirds of the way down the league. This puts their qualification for the 2025 Champions Trophy in jeopardy. Only the first seven teams will make the grade — the criterion was one of the best-kept secrets when the World Cup began. Perhaps nothing succeeds like failure.
India have won all their matches convincingly at this stage, making them strong candidates to join Australia (2003 and 2007) as the teams to go through undefeated in this century. Perhaps television is right: there is only one team in this World Cup. For some, however, that team might be Afghanistan who have now beaten three former champions convincingly.
