The Cricket World Cup is over, but don't be too fretful

New Zealand captain Kane Williamson, "one of the best yet least obtrusive batsmen in the world", plays a sweep shot in the Cricket World Cup final, with England wicketkeeper Jos Buttler watching intently.

OPINION: So the Cricket World Cup is over. And the nation that writhed and squirmed on the sofa has collapsed back onto it with a gasp of deflation.

Post coitum omne animal triste est, wrote Galen of Pergamon, after coition every animal is sad. And with the cricket done, what is there now to look forward to? What is there to pull us out of post-orgasmic misery and colour the world again? For as we shade our eyes and scan the Ocean of Tomorrow we see only a dull and cricketless calm, the waves rolling in and fizzling to nothing on the beach, as ceaseless and pointless as the hours of the day or the drawing of breath, and in the gloom we wonder whether there is actually any point in…but wait! What is that forming on the horizon, with oiled and gleaming thigh, with gym-forged chest encased in skin-tight ads for beer and German sporting goods?

Oh yeah oh yeah, verily I say unto you, the All Blacks are coming again soon, resurrected like Jesus, with games against the loathsome Aussies and the boorish Boks and then, oh glory be, the big one, the real World Cup, the one we already own and on which our identity is founded, oh boy oh boy, how could we have forgotten? And up through the soles of our southern-cross jandals fizzes the lust to live.

It's an extraordinary thing this professional sport, this global business. It's the biggest entertainment in the world, more popular than the movies, more popular even than popular music. Sporting event succeeds sporting event, luring us ever onward:  The Masters, The Open, le Tour and The Ashes, the This Cup, the That Cup, month after month till 12 have gone by and we're all a year older, then everything starts up again.

Why? Because it makes money. How? By making us feel feelings. We love feeling feelings. For though we think of ourselves as thinkers, feeling feelings is easier than thinking thoughts, and more exciting. And that excitement loosens the strings of our purses.

By evolutionary nature we are tribal and competitive. And nothing is more tribal and competitive than sport. Sport fizzes our most primitive juices. And it does so in the most delicious way: if the team loses, well, it's only a game and nobody died. But if the team wins it arouses warm feelings of tribal identity, and the pronouns I and they merge into a simple national we.

Consider the young men who represented us. From Slingshot Lockie with his Biggles moustache, to nice Trent Boult with his well-pressed trousers and his well-parted hair, dismissing the world's best batsmen with a sweet shy smile.  From the unimprovably-named de Grandhomme, to the thoughtful Mitchell Santner who looks like Daniel Vettori's love-child but for his prowling panther gait.

From Martin Guptill, battered by ill fortune but refusing to be bowed, to quiet Ross Taylor, with the quickest wrists in cricket. And presiding over this crowd of virtue the incomparable Kane, Captain Paradox, young yet wise, demure yet steely, polite yet unbudgeable, one of the best yet least obtrusive batsmen in the world.

It would be nice to think that these young men, these modest heroes, say something about our national character, our quiet determination, our fundamental decency down here on these windy rocks. Nice but delusional. They are fine cricketers and they seem fine young men but you and I are no more Captain Kane than all Americans are Donald Trump. Every nation is a hotchpotch of mongrels. But it is one of the joys of sport to let us pretend otherwise.

Source: Stuff.co.nz

Powered by NewsAPI.org

Keywords:

Cricket World Cup • New Zealand national cricket team • Kane Williamson • Batting (cricket) • Whitewash (sport) • 2008 Mumbai attacks • Cricket World Cup • England cricket team • Wicket-keeper • Jos Buttler • Cricket World Cup • DEFLATE • Galen • Sexual intercourse • Cricket (insect) • Orgasm • Depression (mood) • Colour the World • Wait what • Beer • German Americans • New Zealand national rugby union team • Jesus • Vices & Virtues • Boy Oh Boy (The Wilkinsons song) • The New Zealand Herald • Entertainment • World • Popular music • Sport • Sport • Masters Tournament • The Open Championship • Emotion • Feeling • Emotion • Feeling • Emotion • Thought • Thought • Psychomotor agitation • Evolution • Nature • Delicious Way • It's Only a Game • Slingshot • Biggles • Moustache • Trent Boult • Laurence de Grandhomme • Mitchell Santner • Daniel Vettori • Love Child (song) • Gait • Martin Guptill • Ross Taylor • Cricket • Paradox • Nice • Donald Trump • Mongrel •