The United States is starting to embrace cricket – can we keep nothing sacrosanct?

Cricketing authorities have often seemed ambivalent about the idea of growing the game.

Innovations were for decades greeted with suspicion. Rules for players and spectators were complex and elitist. International tournaments have appeared designed to exclude all but the very top teams.

In this context, the current T20 World Cup is a remarkable advance, featuring as it does a roster of 20 teams – four more than at the last two editions. Papua New Guinea, Oman and Nepal are there, rubbing shoulders with the big beasts of global cricket – India, Australia, England et al. This is just as it should be.