2007 Cricket World Cup
From Frikipedia
Contents |
Overview
The 2007 CWC took place in the West Indies, and was designed to be a glorious celebration of corporate greed. The winners were once again deigned to be Australia, the inscription of their name onto the trophy taking place 6 months before the tournament began to save on costs.
The Structure aka "What? We've got ANOTHER game?"
The structure of the tournament was tweaked from earlier competitions after some larger cricketing nations complained that there was a slight chance they would get knocked out before the semi-finals. Thus, the misnomeric "Super Eights" was born, allowing every team to play seven competitive games and ensuring that any odd slip up to a weaker nation would ultimately not matter so long as they won the majority of their games.
The only caveat with this system was the initial group phase, where the 16 nations (three of which had never played a game of cricket before in their lives) were split into 4 groups of 4, the top two from each qualifying for the aforementioned borefest that was the Super Eights.
After an almost interminable length of time, the top four from the Super Eight table would qualify for the semi-finals, and from that point on the whole thing was expected to become something resembling a competitive tournament.
The Crowds aka "Strewth, I've got a flamin' stand to meself!"
The West Indian authorities worked long and hard to build new stadia for the matches to take place in. All were rigorously bedecked with official sponsors (to the point where stickers were placed over the "Armitage Shanks" logos on the washbasins in the toilets, because they hadn't paid to have their name at the ground). Sadly, the drawback of this was the decision to ramp up ticket prices for what was already a bit of a trek for most other nations fans.
Crowd chants of "You could have come in a taxi!" are usually reserved for smug home fans at football games when the away fans fail to fill their seating allocation, but could well have been the official jingle of the 2007 CWC. Just about every game has been less than 1/4 full, and desperate TV directors have been forced to place microphones right next to the small enclaves of the rich people who had managed to get in and concentrate on tight angle shots of geoffs to try and maintain the illusion that someone in the stadium actually gives a crap.
The Results aka "Was there even a game today?"
The pre-qualifying group phase caught out cricketing superpowers such as India, Pakistan and Kenya, and allowed weaker teams like Ireland, Bangladesh and England into the Super Eights. Good for them, but terrible for the tournament organisers, who were now left with the prospect of trying to sell tickets to a month of one-sided matches, tickets which were priced at a cost only 300% higher than the average West Indian persons yearly salary.
Coupled to that, depressed Indian and Pakistani fans went home, not using their tickets to Super Eight games that they had bought in advance, because those games were now Ireland v Bangladesh and would be gash.
In the Super Eights, Australia, Sri Lanka, New Zealand and South Africa have maintained a rather turgid run of form which effectively means they qualified for the semis with still 2 weeks of matches left to go. One or two dead rubbers at the end of a major tournament is to be expected. This CWC will have approximately 14.
The Final aka "I can't see anything!!"
Main Article: 2007 Cricket World Cup Final
Friki Verdict
The LG/Pepsi Friki Verdict in association with Honda, Hutch, Cable & Wireless, Red Stripe, Visa and Scotiabank awards the 2007 CWC 1 Celtic Cross out of 5 and....hang on, a word from our sponsors....sorry, we meant 5 crosses. Yes, it's been awesome hasn't it.
