So after five weeks, we finally know who will meet in the Final. New Zealand's tight-knit unit of over-achievers finally met their match in Sri Lanka and today the Mohali showdown ended in a bit of a damp squib, not that the Mohali faithful would have minded!
Of course, the India v Pakistan semi-final was always going to be more than a mere cricket match. With both country's political leaders sitting together in the stands, this was a chance to prove that sport can unite as well as divide and time will tell whether or not this World Cup fixture brought the nations closer together in more ways than one. An end to the cricketing ban on Pakistan from India would be a start.
Anyway, for the neutral, an Indian victory was probably the preferred outcome, although I for one was pleased to see this new look Pakistan team emerge from the dismal debacle of last summer, when they were tainted with the dark stain of corruption. Their surprisingly straightforward progress to the last four had been built on the strength of their bowling, and spinners in particular. None of their batsmen scored anything approaching 300 runs for the tournament, and so to reach the final they had to silence the home crowd by making swift inroads into the famed Indian batting line-up. That they failed to do, yet they had only themselves to blame. With another bright, breezy but brief cameo from Sehwag, the fielders contrived to drop no fewer than four catches from Sachin Tendulkar. Giving that genius one chance is one too many, but four?! By the time Shahid Afridi showed his men how to hold a ball without dropping it, Tendulkar had scored 85 and a decent score was very much on the cards.
Credit to the bowlers; they managed to put the brakes on the Indian middle-order, with Yuvraj Singh bowled first ball, Dhoni looking lost and the tail - Raina apart - failing to wag. No wickets for Afridi this time but Wahab Riaz proved he deserved his place ahead of the now-retired Shoaib Akhtar by taking five. Still, 260-9 was a decent score, even if there had been not one six in the innings.
The first three batsmen made reasonable progress towards the target, but Younis Khan and Misbah-ul-Haq were too slow in the middle section, and despite the latter's defiant blows near the end, the required run rate rose steadily. Umar Akmal made a quick 29 but when Pakistan needed their big-hitting all-rounders Afridi and Razzaq to up the tempo they yet again failed to deliver. Each of the Indian attack snared two wickets and it was Nehra, not Zaheer Khan, who proved the most economical as Pakistan fell 29 short.
Sachin Tendulkar was named Man of the Match and now he moves on to Mumbai perhaps to reach his destiny. Will he win the World Cup? Will he score his hundredth international century in the process? Of course, Sri Lanka face their own fairytale finale, with Muttiah Muralitharan set to play his last game for his country, and he surely will take part, even if on crutches. The world's best batsman of his generation against the world's best bowler. What a climax it should be! Let's hope the Final delivers...
