Dileep Premachandran writes in the Guardian that the Asian sides in general and India in particular can learn a lot from the selection calls England made for their successful World Twenty20 campaign.

England's last World Cup campaign in the Caribbean is best remembered for pre-dawn pedalos and Battle of the Bottle headlines. This time, the Red Stripes and the El Dorados went hand-in-hand with terrific team spirit. With 2011 looming, the first thing to do is follow Andy Flower's example and be ruthless in squad selection. Yesterday's six-hitters are of no use tomorrow.

Picking players on reputation is always tempting, but it seldom works. Misbah-ul-Haq, for example, got Pakistan to within a big hit of winning the 2007 World Twenty20 final. But what has been his output over the past 12 months? Is it worth persisting with him when an exciting talent such as Hammad Azam waits backstage?

For India, the decisions to be made are harder still. Yuvraj Singh is hardly in the same age bracket as Misbah or Jayasuriya, yet the feeling persists that we may already have seen the best of him. His waistline and lethargic movement in the field tell you exactly why Gary Kirsten felt compelled to have a rant and now is perhaps the best time for him to address the injuries that have plagued him in recent seasons.

England arrived to a distinct Twenty20 welcome at Gatwick with the surreal tag of world champions in the shortest format. Barney Ronay, of the Guardian, was there among a troop of reporters to record each moment.

Before long it became clear a small misjudgment had taken place. We had a steward-shortfall, combined with a surge into the main hall by the bored or the merely cricket-curious. Mild logjam-chaos ensued. James Tredwell was very slightly jostled. Tim Bresnan got bogged down shaking hands. Ryan Sidebottom paused, presidential-style, to kiss a baby (this turned out to be his own daughter, Indiana Sidebottom). Touchingly the spin coach Mushtaq Ahmed, who seems to have a mummy bear role opposite Andy Flower's paterfamilias, could be seen hugging each player in turn as they left the hall.

The Indian team has no official spokesperson, yet, the BCCI either gags them or instructs them to lie low. So how can they possibly speak for themselves? Many of its young players have little formal education or social skills. Even after defeat, were they all expected to hide in their rooms and mope? Kadambari Murali Wade asks these questions in the Hindustan Times.

They messed up in the Caribbean and that needs to be seriously examined in cricket- ing terms, but more often than not, especially in the last two years, the Indian team has given us much joy and lots to be proud of. We need to remember that. Here's what one India bats- man said after the team got back from the Windies. “The World Cup's seven months down the line and this has all (the over- the-top reaction) been quite scary. I'm going to send my family away during the Cup, because, God forbid we lose, someone might try and burn my house down.“ And if that happens, Indian cricket will never be the same again.

England's fearless approach after the 14th over of their chase in the World T20 final encapsulated much of what the team created by Andy Flower and led by Collingwood, is about. They play without fear, either of consequence or recrimination. They take responsibility for their actions in the knowledge that their judgment will be respected and that if things do not go according to plan, then another will make sure a situation is rectified, writes Mike Selvey in the Guardian.

Everything to the last detail is monitored and logged: opposition, and individual performances down to wind direction (at Bridgetown they knew that the six‑hitting side was to the Greenidge-Haynes stand), boundary sizes, hitting distances, anything that will help. Flower, a disciple of Moneyball, Michael Lewis's book about the statistics-driven baseball team, the Oakland Athletics, believes that "we are only scratching the surface with cricket stats. They will play an increasing role in how you formulate strategies or pick players."

In the same paper, former England coach Duncan Fletcher is all praise for Collingwood, who he says is successful because of his hard work and tremendous character, despite all that was thrown at him in the past.

Every time I coach young cricketers I use Paul Collingwood as an example of the perfect role model. I have been working in Zimbabwe these past five days, giving batting master-classes to some of their elite squad. After one session I held a Q&A with Kevin Curran, the Under-19 coach, and some of his players. Kevin asked: "When I was in England I just couldn't see Paul Collingwood as much of a player. Why has he become so good?"

In the Times, Richard Hobson wonders if Andrew Strauss' captaincy and position in the one-day team is under threat with the emergence of players like Michael Lumb.

But the selectors may wish to build the side for next year’s World Cup around the successful XI out here. And the substitution of Strauss for Michael Lumb will give a different feel to the top of the order. It is not as simple as swapping one left-hander for another.

In the Daily Mail, Nasser Hussain ponders over the same question about Strauss. He feels No.3 would be the best position, as long as it relieves the pressure off Pietersen in the middle order.

Can he still open following the success of Craig Kieswetter and Michael Lumb? If England have found a pair who can be productive in Twenty20 power-play overs then surely the same principles apply in 50-over cricket and they should carry on where they left off in Barbados.

The ICC's organising and handling of the World Twenty20 2010 was a marked improvement from the 2007 World Cup, but it was still not the best it could be. A trip to the Caribbean is meant to be a once in a lifetime experience, but in terms of crowd turn-out and player satisfaction, the event was found wanting, writes Anand Vasu in the Hindustan Times.

Travelling between islands in the West Indies has never been a smooth ride, but some of the horror stories from this tour- nament need repeating. The major airline, Liat (variously expanded to Luggage In Another Town or Leaves Island Any Time) once put Sunil Gavaskar in a jump seat along side the pilots. At other times, people with confirmed reser- vations were offloaded, flights left either half an hour before scheduled time or after and scores were left stranded without their baggage. Proper infra- structure is the first check before awarding a region or country a major event. Either the ICC could not fix problems, or just overlooked them.

England finally broke their world tournament jinx, making the transition from being remotely competitive to ultra competitive. No longer do we look on an England one-day team and despair at a relative lack of power, fitness and athleticism, writes Michael Atherton in the Times.

Despite that, yesterday was not one of those “Where were you when” occasions for a number of reasons. Principally, because there is widespread recognition that it is not the pinnacle of the game — not at international level, at any rate. Take a straw poll of English professional cricketers and ask them which domestic one-day tournament they would like to win and the unanimous choice would be Twenty20. But at international level, cricketers still regard the fifty-over World Cup as the pinnacle of the one-day game.

In the same paper, John Westerby writes on the discovery of the Lumb-Kieswetter alliance, and a stroke of luck, courtesy Stuart Broad.

Broad steadied himself under the catch, cupped his hands in readiness, but the ball mysteriously landed a couple of yards behind him. In the dusky, desert sky, he had completely lost track of the grey-white ball. Sidebottom’s reaction was typically apoplectic. But little did he know that Broad had just inadvertently set in motion a chain of events that would dramatically change England’s Twenty20 fortunes.

A catch on the rebound, a direct hit, reverse sweeps, the six-hitting, the yorkers and the devious, slow long-hops - this is the new England. Suddenly they feel like a force in international one-day cricket and it's all because they made things happen, rather than sit back and wait, writes Vic Marks in the Guardian. But how will this performance affect future selections?

Strauss has to play because he is the captain. So someone has to give way and that will probably be the sacrificial Lumb. It would be surprising if Michael Yardy retained his place in the 50-over game. Yardy's method is predicated specifically for the Twenty20 game. He bowls in a manner that is designed to yield six runs per over, which is not so helpful in the longer format. They must also decide whether they prefer Kieswetter to Matt Prior in the 50‑over game (they probably will).

In the Independent, Stephen Brenkley wonders if Test cricket will be able to survive the assault of T20. He says the ICC must act quickly to make Tests more of a spectator sport.

Test cricket should not be doomed because it remains at its (rare) best a riveting, brave spectacle – the Ashes last summer, the matches against South Africa last winter. But it has lost spectator appeal not only because T20 is more obviously exciting and tends to narrow the gap between competing sides (how refreshing that the two best sides reached the final yesterday) but because too many series are far from being between equally matched teams. Test cricket may be the best form of sport devised by man but it needs people to watch it and that means contests in which both teams have a chance of winning. It was never meant to be a private affair.

In the Telegraph, Simon Briggs says the factor behind England's success was that they had comprehensively ditched what was once an angst-ridden, safety-first gameplan and displayed a swagger from the start of the game. Their gambles paid off too.

Or take Collingwood’s move to call Luke Wright into the attack when Michael Yardy started to leak boundaries for the first time in the tournament. Here was a man who hadn’t bowled a ball all tour, coming on to bowl at the brawny Cameron White. The result? Five singles and a wicket, as White heaved at a slower ball and was brilliantly caught in the outfield.

In the same paper, Andy Bull writes on the reception Kevin Pietersen received from the Bajan crowd.

"KP! You the boss today man! The boss! Stick it to those Aussies, boy! Over the top, everythin' over the top, boy! Who got 500 dollars who don't like England? Who got 500? All my money KP! I got all my money on you today, boy!"

The English counties will be pinning their hopes on a World Twenty20 win because a big booty there could help bail themselves out of their financial woes, writes Vic Marks in the Observer. Several Test grounds have been lured into making expensive developments, only to realise there is a limited amount of international cricket. A win bonus should change things.

Around the counties they will be hoping for a surge of interest as a consequence of England's advance to the final. When India won the first World Twenty20 in South Africa in 2007 the ramifications were enormous. A format that was despised in India was suddenly embraced. The dollar signs started to flash and the entrepreneurs swooped. An English victory in Barbados today would not have such a dramatic impact, but it could invigorate the Twenty20 tournament here in June and July.

In the Sunday Times, Simon Wilde writes that Paul Collingwood should warn his team against giving Australia an escape route, like Pakistan did in the semis.

Australia also look vulnerable with who follows them. Neither Brad Haddin nor Clarke, who have lately come in at three and four, have had good tournaments; there is a growing view in Australia that Clarke is not worth a place in this format as a player. Australia have been relying on a deadly lower middle order for salvation, Cameron White and the Hussey brothers having hit 28 sixes between them.

In the same paper, Martin Johnson looks back at England's forgettable history in major tournament finals.

In the Telegraph, former captain Michael Vaughan feels that a World T20 win for England will rank higher than the Ashes.

And if we win we will have beaten a fine Australian side in the final, and it will send out a signal to the world that we are playing good cricket. It would be a remarkable achievement for Paul Collingwood and Andy Flower, who deserves great credit for what he has done with this team, but regardless of today's result England can look forward to a bright future in one-day cricket.

In the same paper, Steve James credits the man behind the scenes, Andy Flower, for England's rise.

But, somehow, this is how the wheel has turned. Flower has become an astute and authoritative leader. Persuasive, too, in coaxing a most reluctant Collingwood to retake the reins. And Collingwood has improved. He is clearly still no tactical genius and in this tournament he has had a stinker with the bat (an average of precisely 8.16). Win today and history will not record such technicalities.

In the Hindustan Times, Anand Vasu praises Australia's semi-final hero Michael Hussey. Listening to the man popularly known as Mr Cricket, is like hearing the heartbeat of Australian cricket.

To look into Hussey’s eyes as he spoke was to understand the Australian passion for the game. There’s little doubt that India’s cricketers, and fans, are among the most passionate in the world, but the Australian affair is a wholly different one. It’s not the kind that results in houses being tarred after a loss or angry fans smashing windshields of the cars of players who have failed. The Australian way is to take the game so seriously as to demand the best of each player every time. It is an impatience with those who are mentally soft or can’t execute basic skills properly. There’s no time for someone who isn’t as fit as he possibly could be or fields even one percent worse than is humanly possible through sheer preparation and practice.

It's something the BCCI is unwilling to admit. If it's not obvious already, India have been eliminated from a World Twenty20, immediately after an IPL, for the second time in a row. The inability to tackle the short ball in the T20 format is projected as the main reason for the debacle, but the real reason is the awful, awful timing of the IPL, writes Shekhar Gupta in the Indian Express.

It isn’t just that the IPL is leaving players injured or fatigued. Players, as Sangakkara had the good sense to state, have the right to decide whether or not to play IPL. But is that a decision you can leave to individual players? Maybe a Tendulkar or a Dhoni can afford to sit out of a future IPL to preserve himself. But a Rohit Sharma, a Piyush Chawla, a Zaheer Khan? I mention those three names in particular because, if you go back to your T20 world cup footage, theirs are the chubbiest cheeks and they are some of the people Kirsten is complaining about.

Merely questioning the Indian players' commitment towards the World Twenty20 isn't going to solve any problems. The BCCI should also be held accountable and reassess itself in the way it treats its players and prepares them for a big tournament. The blame should be spread out, writes Partha Bhaduri in the Times of India.

If you share the spoils, then it’s only fair that you share the blame. For the BCCI, which has stoked systemic greed, there are two ways forward: it can either let things be and hope India’s batsmen blast everything out of sight on flat home pitches in next year’s 50-over World Cup. Luckily, the event precedes the IPL, offering a perfect opportunity to brush things under the carpet. Or Shashank Manohar & Co can start identifying areas which need overhauling. It’s all right asking players to be professional, to be committed to a level of excellence that goes above commercial considerations, but the Board should remember professionalism is environmental. A look in the mirror wouldn’t hurt.

In Cricketnext, Gaurav Kalra writes that Indian supporters should stop wasting their time mercilessly crucifying the players and instead focus more about how to make them better players.

Fleeting as it may have been, even in the West Indies we witnessed sparks of special skill. Raina's ton against South Africa and Rohit Sharma's back to the wall belligerence against the Windies gave us little saplings of hope. We must urge and pressure the our administrators to find ways to help that talent flower. Must they be sent away for a couple of months to overcome the kinks in their technique? Could we pick up the phone to Jimmy Amarnath or ask Sunny Gavaskar to take them away for a couple of weeks and train them in the art of facing up to the short ball?

In the Hindu, Peter Roebuck feels half the team is over-rated and a few big names ought to be ditched.

The fielding was dreadful, the bowling was wayward and the batting was inept. Only a few players survived the examination. The rest looked like pampered millionaires more interested in sweets than sweat. And let's not listen to any idle excuses about pitches or parties. Players are not forced to stay up all night whilst the tracks in the Caribbean were superbly suited to rewarding the genuine. Better to acknowledge the scale of the defeat, examine its causes and seek immediate remedies.

An editorial in the same paper says that every facet of India's game bore signs of the malaise.

Also in need of attention is scheduling — the off-season has disappeared as has the break between assignments; with no time for reflection and skill development, is it reasonable to expect improvement?

The reason for England's rise from no-hopers to title contenders is that they have found the right personnel to master the three distinct phases of the T20 game, writes Mike Selvey in the Guardian. The discovery of Craig Kieswetter and Michael Lumb is an example.

Against Sri Lanka, even after the bowlers had done such a professional job, there was still a danger that a side adept in strangling the opposition on slow and grabby pitches might make the chase a cumbersome affair. Inside eight overs, Kieswetter and Lumb had consigned that idea to the bin, their opening partnership proving so confident and incendiary that it left a relative stroll for Kevin Pietersen. He, nonetheless, batted with such massive authority that he has now scored 95 from 59 balls either side of the birth of young Dylan.

'Choking' is very much a part of sport. Ask Greg Norman or Jana Navotna, the former's meltdown in the final round of the 1996 Masters and the latter's collapse in the 1993 Wimbledon final. Talk of choking in cricket and you think South Africa. Neil Manthorp analyses cricket's repeat-offenders in the Mail and Guardian Online.

Later they both described how they felt, as though they were moving in slow-motion, unable to change the tempo or affect the flow of the contest. Crowd noises seemed muffled, words of advice only half penetrated their heads as though trapped outside by a mucous membrane. Defeat was still such a long way off as they entered their state of choke that nobody believed it was inevitable, or even likely. Except, that is, for Norman and Novotna.

Paul Collingwood may sound like a broken record, but his team is anything but one. They have exceeded all expectations to reach the finals of the World Twenty20, and their supporters were treated to a 'steamroller' in St Lucia against Sri Lanka, writes Andy Bull in the Guardian.

Long time followers of England are used to experiencing to a range of emotions. Angst. Despair. Irritation. Occasionally even elation. But not many have felt anything quite like this before. Not only have England played their way to a first global tournament final since 2004, but they have done it with a conviction and efficiency that feels entirely alien. So this is what consistency feels like. "I'm going to sound like a broken record," said Paul Collingwood as he sang his side's praises yet again post-match.

Dileep Premachandran writes in the National that the World Twenty20 has exposed the weaknesses in the Asian bloc, despite Pakistan and Sri Lanka featuring in the semi-finals.

Both previous World T20 finals were all-Asian affairs, with Pakistan the common factor. Since last June though, Australia have cottoned on to what makes a T20 side tick, while England have also been strengthened by the emergence of a couple of impact players who have transformed a middle-of-the-road outfit into one with a genuine chance of ending their title drought in the international arena.

It is not hard to identify where the Asians have stumbled. Sri Lanka have been decent in the field, but both India and Pakistan were woeful. Ravindra Jadeja, of India, and Pakistan’s Saeed Ajmal took turns to show off their butter-fingered prowess, while the ground-fielding was a mish-mash of awkward dives, poor stops and weak throws back to the wicketkeeper.

Andy Bull analyses the four semi-finalists of the World Twenty20 in his weekly email, the Spin, an excerpt of which is published in the Guardian.

Using Roger Moore's toupee-era Bond films as a point of reference is a habit I normally try to keep to my inner monologue, so excuse me when I say that Australia remind the Spin of Max Zorin screaming "More! More power! More!" in the closing scenes of a View To A Kill. More power. The Australians have three 90mph fast bowlers, with the added advantage that two of them are left-armers. Dirk Nannes is the best Twenty20 quick left in the competition. He is complemented by the wayward but dangerous Shaun Tait and, as an absurdly good first change, Mitchell Johnson.

Dileep Premachandran lays into the Indian team in the Guardian, in the aftermath of their World Twenty20 debacle.

The fielding, so eye-catchingly good in South Africa in 2007, has regressed back to the mediocrity of old. How would it not? There are at least a couple of men in the squad who could auction for Weight Watchers' before-and-after ads given the amount of inches they've put on around the waist. Lard might not have inhibited Colin Milburn or Inzamam-ul-Haq unduly in their pomp, but in a form of the game where fitness and agility are paramount – witness the way David Warner prowls the outfield – double-pillow paunches and punch-drunk reactions are inexcusable. Ravindra Jadeja, so poor with the ball against Australia and West Indies, can thank his lucky stars for the comically inept Saeed Ajmal, or else he'd have had the Worst Fielder award to take home as well.

Nasser Hussain writes in Mail Online his appreciation of the manner in which England have adapted to different situations during the World Twenty20, and credits Andy Flower for the turnaround.

At the Kensington Oval, England went at Pakistan with pace but in St Lucia against a good New Zealand side on a slower wicket they took pace off the ball, bowled lots of cutters and slower bouncers and generally looked like a highly effective side.

England's bowlers are thinking on their feet in the middle and a lot of planning and knowledge has gone into the team's performances. England have been pro-active while many of their opponents, like South Africa, have been reactive and much of the credit for what is happening out here must go to Andy Flower.

In the Independent, Stephen Brenkley uses Tim Bresnan's example to explain the confidence and self-belief running through the England ranks.

Bresnan exemplifies their progress. In 2006, when he was first called up by England to play against a rampant Sri Lanka he looked out of his depth. But gradually, and most assuredly this winter, he has become an outstanding international player, an authentic allrounder. He has been entrusted with bowling the first and last overs in most innings and holds down the No 7 position. If you have to go into bat in that position in a Twenty20 match the likelihood is that your team is in the cart.

The reduced ticket prices and relaxation of rules pertaining to muscial instruments have brought the joy back to the cricket-watching public in the West Indies. DNA reports in detail.

Underneath the Greenidge and Haynes stand, named after former Barbados and West Indies opening batsmen Gordon and Desmond, cooks spice up the chicken and the beef stew, while fans from all over the cricketing world share a beer.

"The noise is fantastic. It's totally different from Australia, you can walk into this ground carrying anything you like, when you go in the MCG you can't take anything in. They'd strip you naked if they could at the MCG," said Australian supporter Peter Mulgrove.

In the Independent, Robin Scott-Elliott takes a tongue-in-cheek view at the various coalitions in the World Twenty20, including the England side and the commentary team.

Coalition may be a whole new ball game here, but over in the Caribbean it could not be working better as three South Africans, an Irishman and some Englishmen have joined together under the guidance of a Zimbabwean to see off a whole lot more South Africans and some Irishmen with South Africans and Australians stirred in. It's complicated.

England have displayed a swagger not seen very often from them in limited-overs cricket. They're talking about hitting sixes, a testosterone-choked type of cricket that might have evolved out of some unsmilingly moustachioed New York basement of the late-1970s. England are at last doing something extreme. But will it work? Barney Ronay wonders. Read on in the Guardian.

The six can still shed new light on cricketers you felt you already knew well. Against Ireland Luke Wright could be seen making an unexpected American-style whooping noise mid-pitch after crunching a straight hit into the sightscreen, the sort of noise you might hear in a 1980s movie set in a rowdy hard-living country and western-ish bar just before a violent brawl breaks out, perhaps involving Patrick Swayze doing stiff-backed kung fu.

Those were the only words uttered by Umesh Yadav's father, a coalmine worker in Nagpur, when he found that his son had been asked to join the Indian World Twenty20 team in the West Indies. The Indian Express traces the rise of India's latest fast-bowling sensation.

Four years ago, when Yadav hitched a truck ride to Nagpur from his village to play a game of tennis ball cricket, he wouldn’t have dreamt where the 25-km journey might take him. Packing his bags in a mad rush on Thursday, Yadav was in a daze. But those who know him were saying they always felt his raw, natural pace would fast-track him to international cricket.

“I have just collected my tickets from the Vidarbha cricket office, it still hasn’t sunk in. My parents are very excited but nervous as well. They are village people and have very little idea of the world outside. All my father asked was ‘When will you return home?’,” Yadav told The Indian Express after getting the most important call of his short cricketing career.

Mike Atherton, writing in the Times, reviews the film Out of the Ashes, a remarkable story of the Afghanistan cricket team that put up a brave show at the World Twenty20 this year. It begins with a group of cricketers playing, not in whites, but in shalwar kameez and tracks their progress to the international scene.

Filming in Afghanistan, in the middle of a war, does not sound the easiest of tasks, but Albone told me this week that only once, returning from Jalalabad, when they were held up by a roadside bombing, did they feel threatened. Otherwise, he says, the war was a footnote to the story. “We wanted to give the Afghans a voice,” he says, and, of course, they wanted to talk cricket rather than war.

The film is not sentimental and the story speaks for itself, and it is the details of discovery that are often the most telling: the look of wariness as one of the players steps into a lift for the first time, in Dubai airport; the joy they feel in Tanzania when they get to swim in the ocean for the first time; and the bemusement when they come across traffic lights for the first time, in Jersey. “Something to do with rules and regulations,” one says, thinking, no doubt, of the chaos on the roads in Kabul.

Andy Bull, writing in his blog The Spin in the Guardian, says Afghanistan’s continuing development as a cricketing nation hinges on two factors: developing the game at the grass-root level and a steady diet of top-level cricket, including three- and four-day games.

The Asian Cricket Council, which has done much to help the team along the way, is already working to arrange fixtures. In the short-term their most likely opponents are Zimbabwe and Bangladesh. Afghanistan would not be out of their depth against either side. In fact if any of the players are reading this, and judging by the stick they gave me for one of the recent pieces I wrote about them they may well be, they will probably be irritated that I haven't come out and made them firm favourites to beat both nations.

Lawrence Booth, writing in the Wisden Cricketer, says that while the Duckworth-Lewis method may have its flaws, England's performance against West Indies and Ireland had shortcomings. Paul Collingwood's criticism of the D-L system following the defeat to the hosts, Booth says, reflects a "siege mentality" which is best avoided when not in a position of strength.

Take the West Indies game. England batted superbly, it’s true: an explosive starter, a consolidatory main course and a dreamy dessert. But it wasn’t Frank Duckworth or Tony Lewis who allowed West Indies to batter 30 off 2.2 overs before the rain came and apparently skewed the maths thereafter. Neither did D/L contribute to the eight wides England conceded in 5.5 overs. The truth was England were sloppy and Ryan Sidebottom bowled the wrong length to Chris Gayle. And, don’t forget, West Indies scraped home with only one ball to spare: this was no stroll.

The distance, and the resulting lack of urgency in the World Twenty20, turns out to be rather welcome after the eyebrow-singeing, trouser-igniting hysteria of the IPL, writes Giles Smith in the Times.

True, the final over that Pakistan bowled at Australia the other day yielded a five-wicket maiden, and you don’t often see one of those, outside of a beach game featuring children under 8 and an ultra-competitive dad. In the main, though, the rhythm and the tone feel rather becoming. In fact (whisper it), they feel quite a lot like cricket.

S Dinakar, writing in the Hindu, says India's bowling line-up should receive a boost in friendlier conditions in Barbados. He adds that Piyush Chawla should be retained, for he has the attributes of a match-winner, while Ravindra Jadeja should make way for Zaheer Khan.

Jadeja is a handy bat, a wonderful fielder and a useful left-arm spinner but Chawla has the attributes of a match-winner. There were indications during India's match against South Africa that Chawla might be a success in the tournament.

The chances are that Harbhajan and Chawla could, as the tournament progresses, develop into a threatening spin combination. India needs to back match-winners.

After two comfortable victories in the first stage of the World Twenty20, India's batsmen, including Suresh Raina, face a stiffer challenge on bouncier tracks in Barbados, writes S Dinakar in the Hindu.

Raina has had his share of problems against short-pitched deliveries. Under the circumstances, it was surprising why the mercurial Dale Steyn, despite the nature of the surface, did not quite go for the jugular against the left-hander on Sunday. An Australian team, in contrast, would have been ruthless.

It must also be mentioned that Raina — he has striven to get into a more side-on position against the bouncing ball — is an improving batsman against short-pitched bowling.

But the extent of his improvement can only be determined against red-hot quicks on livelier surfaces.

Anand Vasu writes in the Hindustan Times that though the ICC has righted several mistakes of the 2007 World Cup by keeping ticket prices low and allowing fans to bring in musical instruments in St Lucia, the timing of several matches are designed for TV audiences, keeping the number of spectators at the stadium low.

Jamie Pandaram writes in the Sydney Morning Herald that while the rest of the cricket world is enjoying watching the World Twenty20, the same can't be said for most TV viewers in the Caribbean.

Many locals cannot watch their own team compete in a global tournament they are hosting, because the local broadcaster chosen to show live matches is barely available to residents.

Darren Sammy is the only St Lucian in the Windies side. He produced one of the all-time great individual performances - 30 runs off 17 balls, 3-8 off three overs, and four catches - to lead the hosts to victory over Ireland in their first match on Friday night but the island was oblivious. Many flocked to see a famed preacher giving a sermon, while others let loose at the infamous Gros Islet street party.

Sharda Ugra blogs in India Today that the presence of a team from strife-ridden Afghanistan is reason enough to follow the World Twenty20.

Once again, men with new names come onto cricket’s biggest stage - Stanikzai, Ahmadzai, Shenwari, Zadran. Pathan names, names of tribes and geographies. Some of this team were born in the sprawling refugee camps in Pakistan, others in places whose datelines usually carry grim news.

Going by logic, all Afghanistan will get from the World T20 are two matches five days apart – India on Saturday and South Africa on May 5. What these cricketers from a country of conflict have already brought is a calming perspective to a sport often battling within itself over commerce, power and race.

After South Africa's innumerable disappointments in ICC tournaments, Neil Manthorp pleads with the side, in Mail & Guardian Online, to try and avoid a choke this time around in the West Indies.

Unlike England, South Africa have at least won one ICC tournament out of the past 20. Remember the inaugural Champions Trophy in Bangladesh in 1998? No, not many do. There were limited expectations back then and, realistically, there should be this time, too.

Pakistan are defending champions, India and Sri Lanka are red hot, the West Indies are hosts and New Zealand are perennial semifinalists at these things. Let's just hope that Smith's boys are not catastrophically embarrassed by Afghanistan in their second group match and take it from there. (No, seriously. Afghanistan qualified. Really.) Get past them and anything could happen.

The last big cricket event in the Caribbean was a disaster, with killjoy regulations, but this wide-open tournament could set things right, says Mike Selvey in the Guardian.

That the World Twenty20 comes so soon after the last edition, an outstanding success in England, is unfortunate, not least for the reigning champions Pakistan, but represents a recalibrating of the international calendar. However, the opportunity for the region to re-establish its cricketing credentials is huge, with a hit-and-dash schedule to match the cricket.

Elsewhere, the Telegraph speaks to Hamid Hassan, Afghanistan's Flintoff.

Claire Taylor, the would-be Ricky Ponting of women's cricket, could have had a well-paid job in IT but is driven by a sporting obsession. In an extensive interview with the Guardian, Taylor talks about starting off as a professional cricketer to her current role as England captain.

"There have been points all through my England career where my dad has said, 'Right, you really need to think about what's going to happen after cricket. Isn't it time now to go out to work?' There's an obvious generational difference in outlook. My parents were both the first generation of their families to make it to university and have middle-class jobs. So their ambitions were centred around a secure house for the family while I was more confident I could pursue this dream and support myself. I guess I was quite selfish."

After the fiasco of the World Cup comes the chance for some serious rebuilding in the land of calypso cricket, writes Vic Marks on his blog in the Observer. Now is the time to claw back some credibility in the Caribbean.

In Guyana, St Lucia and Barbados there is scope for some sort of redemption after the debacle of that World Cup. The tournament can work there; the stands can be filled, though it remains a problem that the stadium in Guyana is in the hinterland of the city of Georgetown; it takes some reaching for the locals. In St Lucia there is a shortage of locals. In Barbados there should be no problem, though it would help if West Indies became contenders for the trophy.

Mark Richardson writes in the Herald on Sunday that New Zealand have all the ingredients to make a major impact in the World Twenty20 in the Caribbean.

It has three world-class performers in McCullum, Taylor and Bond. Vettori is no Fleming yet but could be. And Styris, Oram and Mills are experienced stalwarts.They have just as much if not more batting depth than the 2000 side (which won the Champions Trophy) and I'd say the present team are a better bowling unit.

Stephen Brenkley believes that England's squad selection for the World Twenty20 lacks in long-term planning. Read his entire article in the Independent.

The choice of the 22-year-old wicketkeeper batsman, Craig Kieswetter, flavour of the month and it is to be hoped the decade, makes it certain that England will use their 17th different opening batting combination in 26 T20 internationals. As soon as one pair fails another one is summoned, which is less selection policy than hailing a cab and hoping for the best.

This year's Twenty20 World Cup gives the ICC a chance to put the things right it got so horribly wrong in 2007, writes Mike Selvey in the Guardian.

It is not just the lure of a noisefest that will bring an audience, however, nor even the attraction that is Twenty20 cricket. Rather it is the pricing. Affordability, so goes the official line, is the key. Tickets cost from US$3 (about £2) for single group stage matches (US$5 for double headers) and US$8 for Super Eight games, while semi-finals are US$10-20, with admission to the final in Barbados on May 16 costing US$20-40.

Under 16s get free entry to group matches and discounts elsewhere while there is no charge for entry to the women's matches on St Kitts. If they have learned nothing else from the 2007 fiasco, then this at least is a step in the right direction.

	On top of the world: Shahid Afridi © Associated Press

From talking to each player individually, to group discussions and exercises like 'rock and roll', the Pakistan team's psychologist, Max Babri, shares his experiences throughout the World Twenty20 and how he helped shape a famous chapter in the country's cricket history. Waqar Gillani has more in the News on Sunday, the Pakistan daily.

'In our daily life, we interact with each other through our masks. Unless you have a one-on-one interaction you cannot help build mutual trust. I told them to be honest and frank. Gradually, they began to open up. Some of them even cried during the session.

'On the second day of our session, I started hypnotising them. Players were nudged into a trance and urged to understand and envisage themselves as the very best.'

You can also check the special section in the editorial on Pakistan's triumph at the world event on the same page.

Pakistan are resigned to the fact that they will either have to play their ‘home series’ at offshore venues or not play at all. But things are a little different now that they are World Twenty20 champions, according to the editorial in the Dawn. Pakistan’s victory tells the world that they can win wherever they might have to play.

Even in India, which with its deep pockets now virtually controls the ICC. It will take some doing to crush Pakistan’s spirit. We will not simply go away and sulk. We can triumph in the face of adversity. Besides the cup, the best thing this slam-bang version of cricket delivered was a sense of self-belief. Also, this Pakistan side seems to enjoy itself on the field.

South Africa were outplayed by a better team on their day, and didn't choke as the general perception suggests, writes Arthur Turner on the News24 website.

The Proteas lost a closely contested match by seven runs and to term them chokers based on that performance is harsh. Sri Lanka, like South Africa, also only lost one game in the tournament - the final. The performance of the West Indies in the second semi-final looked more like a team choking to me.

Fifty-over cricket, which used to be the livewire teenager to the conservative parents, aka Tests. Not any more. Not with the recent evidence witnessed in the World Twenty20, writes David Leggat in the New Zealand Herald.

The players still swear by the 50-over version. Is there room for all three? Yes, but it's a squeeze. The evidence of the past fortnight suggests the middle ground is on shaky ground.

Despite all the troubles and setbacks that Pakistan have had, their fighting spirit has shone through, writes David Hopps in the Guardian.

Putting national sentiments aside, Pakistan's victory in World Twenty20 was the most joyous outcome imaginable in a tournament replete with happy, vibrant, adventurous cricket, a statement that the sport is so imprinted upon Pakistan's national consciousness that even the awful prospect of a nomadic existence for several years to come, playing Twenty20 in temporary homes around the world, will not break them.

In his blog in the same newspaper Andy Bull writes that Pakistan's carefree approach worked wonders and reminded us of what we've been missing. Younis Khan was ridiculed for saying Twenty20 was 'just entertainment', says Bull, but a laid-back attitude served his team well.

In the Times Simon Barnes says a game of cricket between Sri lanka and Pakistan is a refreshing outbreak of triviality and, as such, something for us all to cheer.

Muhammad Ali, writing in Pakistan's Daily Times, says cricket has always been a big binding force in the country and the team’s success in the World Twenty20 has helped lift the spirits of the people.

Sri Lanka and Pakistan, the finalists for the World Twenty20, have between them four unorthodox spinners and two extraordinary fast bowlers in Ajantha Mendis, Muttiah Muralitharan, Saeed Ajmal, Shahid Afridi, Lasith Malinga and Umar Gul, writes Simon Wilde in the Sunday Times.

Afridi is the only one of the four who bats and if Pakistan win he might again be named player of the tournament, as he was in the inaugural event in 2007. His semi-final performance against South Africa was typically outrageous; the kiss he blew Jacques Kallis as he smashed him to all parts summed it up. I’m here to get under your skin, he was saying. He really is the cock of the walk. To stress the diversity of skills on parade, imagine the scene 25 days from now when the next big match takes place at Lord’s, the second Ashes Test. England will probably field an orthodox off-spinner in Graeme Swann and Australia may pick no spinner at all. This may be the last chance for a while to savour the truly exotic, unless Mendis signs for a county, as well he might.

The World Twenty20 has been fast, fun, furious and highly skilled, writes Steve James in his review of the tournament in the Sunday Telegraph.

Shot of the tournament

Didn't see anything new. Honestly. The Dilscoop, Starfish or whatever you want to call it? Eoin Morgan, among others, has played that before. Every second county player plays the 'Ramp' these days. All bloody dangerous, though. I liked Mahela Jayawardene's back of the bat reverse-sweep off Jacob Oram. Andrew Symonds did it once for Kent against Glamorgan at Maidstone. Classy.

	Batsmen have found Umar Gul's late-innings thrusts hard to deal with © AFP

Vic Marks writes in the Guardian that it's appropriate that Sri Lanka and Pakistan facing each other in the final just three months after the terrorist attack in Lahore. He also lists the similarities in both sides in his preview.

They have spinners who can turn the ball in both directions (Ajantha Mendis and Muttiah Muralitharan for Sri Lanka, Shahid Afridi and Saeed Ajmal for ­Pakistan) and pace bowlers who are incredibly adept at delivering yorkers to order (Lasith Malinga and Umar Gul) plus a couple of left-armers too young to feel fear (Isuru Udana and Mohammad Aamer). Both sides know how to play "tournament" cricket.

In the Independent on Sunday, Stephen Brenkley writes that both Pakistan and Sri Lanka have shown that bowlers have a major say in Twenty20s and batting needn't be all about thuggish slogging. He also names some of the best features of the tournament: top game (England v Netherlands), top innings (Dilshan's unbeaten 96 in the semi-finals), and more.

Pakistan's batting has under-performed in almost every game so far, particularly the senior batsmen Shoaib Malik and Misbah-ul-Haq, writes Kamran Abbasi in the Dawn . He thinks Pakistan has an edge in the in the bowling department, with four showstoppers compared to Sri Lanka's three.

Simon Wilde writes in the Sunday Times that victory for either side will help consign memories of Lahore to the past. Steve James says in the Sunday Telegraph it'll be the bowlers that will decide which side emerges on top at Lord's.

Also read Andrew Miller's preview of the final here.

Not too many had given Younis Khan's side much of a chance in the World Twenty20, but they are now in the final of the tournament. Kamran Abassi writes in the Dawn that one of the reasons for the success, especially against the favourites South Africa, is that Pakistan have played with passion, pride and fearlessness.

This was how it always used to be. When Imran Khan changed the mentality of Pakistan’s cricketers in the early 1980s, he gave them the confidence to risk everything for victory. That philosophy endured under Wasim Akram, Imran’s disciple, but was lost in the introspective days of Inzamam-ul Haq’s leadership.

And in a blog on the Dawn website, Imran Yusuf has a light-hearted piece doling out advice to Pakistan fans.

To the die-hard fan with an encyclopedic knowledge of Pakistan cricket who, every match, stares open-mouthed at the selection of Fawad Alam and asks, dumbfounded, ‘What is he doing there?’: Man, just get over it. It’s like the meaning of life, or one of Donald Rumsfeld’s ‘known unknowns’. Just resign yourself to the fact that some things are forever beyond the understanding of us mere mortals.

Ed Smith writes in the Daily Telegraph that the World Twenty20 has been a hit because of the mix of exciting cricket and the sheer unpredictability of the format.

Of course, there must be a balance in all sports between fairness and uncertainty. If the better team always win, sport becomes boring. But if sport becomes purely a lottery – if, say, a tennis match was decided by a single tie-breaker or a cricket match by a one-over slog – then the result becomes devalued. Twenty20 treads this tightrope between the dramatic and the silly. In this tournament, the drama has outweighed the silliness.

The tournament also gets a thumbs-up from Duncan Fletcher in the Guardian. He says it has given the game just the wake-up call it needed to be able to compete with other sports.

Harsha Bhogle writes in the Indian Express that a good team doesn't become bad overnight. He says that it was the batting that let India down, and that there were no easy bowlers to target in the World Twenty20 unlike the IPL. He doesn't think fatigue or injuries were the major reasons behind India's abysmal show.

Being on tour for long periods is part of the job now and players must rest and train to counter that. It is a personal responsibility and one that is non-negotiable. South Africa have been one of the best teams in this tournament, and one of the sharpest in the field, and they went into the IPL after draining back-to-back Test and one-day series against Australia. Most of their players were at the IPL too. If India’s players are fatigued they need to look within.

And in a scathing piece on exchange4media, a website that focuses on the media and advertising, BV Rao slams the over-the-top, less-than-nuanced coverage of India's defeat by the country's news channels.

They [news channels] have to individually feel the pain and grief of each one of those one billion fans (who did the census, I want to know!) and reflect their collective anger on national TV, so we understand. Our channels take any defeat badly but cricket defeats are especially personal. Not only are the endless hours of hype wasted, the channels are shortchanged on easy content by a few days. Criminal dereliction of national duty on the cricketers’ part, I must say.

New Zealand talked up their chances at the ICC World Twenty20 but after their exit at the Super Eights stage the post-mortems have begun. In the New Zealand Herald, David Leggat points out that their batting was the biggest weakness.

Forget a couple of bullying wins over Scotland and Ireland. Against Pakistan and Sri Lanka they were done like a pot roast. Injuries didn't help but there can be no complaints at being dumped out before the semifinals. They deserved no more. Instead the players and management should be reflecting on what went wrong. Broadly speaking, that won't take long; the bowling was generally tidy, the fielding pretty sharp, which leaves only ...

Chasing 129 to beat South Africa, New Zealand fell two runs short, with five wickets standing. So it didn't matter because both were already through to the Super Eight? Nonsense. Try telling the South Africans that. Plenty of good could have come from beating the tournament favourites.

In the Dominion Post, Jonathan Millmow argues that plenty of questions will be asked of the side but at least there was one positive.

If you were looking for an upside it was a long wait. It came on the last afternoon as Guptill embarked on a solo effort against Sri Lanka's unorthodox attack. Guptill is under-rated by New Zealand's decision-makers.

He tore Australia to shreds at the Gabba last summer, only to be denied by the rain, but there he was the other day against Scotland not used in the top five. Guptill looks increasingly more capable of taking a game by the scruff of the neck than McCullum.

Prem Panicker writes on his blog Smoke Signals that in the World Twenty20, India were missing the crucial self-belief that has helped them fight their way back from tough situations in the recent past.

AB de Villiers’ knock was worth a big hundred, in context: he was the only one among the Proteas who scored at over a run a ball, because he was the only one who absorbed the pressure of the spinners’ chokehold, didn’t mind looking silly while he struggled, and had the mental fortitude to ride the rough and wait for opportunity where his mates looked to somehow muscle their way out of the fix. AB, in fact, alone had what the Indian team lacked on the day.

While the Ashes will now dominate the thoughts of selectors and everyone else in England, at some point they need to review Twenty20 strategy, writes Richard Hobson in the Times.

The middle order clearly needs beefing up and Collingwood's role as nudger at No5 must be in jeopardy with Luke Wright, if he continues to open with Ravi Bopara, offering sup-port to the seam bowlers. England cannot afford to field a team with James Foster as high as No6 and Graeme Swann at 7, as they did two days ago. But it runs deeper than a tinker here or there. The underlying principle that Test players can adapt to any format must be re-evaluated.

In the Guardian Mike Selvey writes that Andrew Strauss and Andy Flower need to see where 50-over cricket fits in the scheme of things. Is it, despite the limited-overs format, closer to Test cricket than it is to Twenty20 cricket?

Before T20, of course, there was no such question, but since its inception, there has been the underlying feeling that T20 is an entity apart. Strauss maintaining the one-day captaincy is a manifestation of this. Were they to be innovative in their thinking, however, they might now want to take T20 as the blueprint and expand that to fit the 50-over game. Come at it from the opposite direction. It seems the natural thing to do because if England do not view it as such, you can bet your life that other teams will.

England were guilty of fudging their selections, writes Nasser Hussain in the Daily Mail.

I cannot see the logic in bringing Napier into the squad and not giving him a single chance to impress. Not even in a warm-up match. The consequence is that we have learned nothing about the man who has made his name in county cricket with his superb Twenty20 performances as a six-hitting batsman and bowler capable of bowling at 90mph. We simply do not know if he is capable of doing what he does for Essex with England.

Mike Atherton feels England's batting has shown no signs of improvement during the tournament but he is impressed by the bowling of Graeme Swann and the keeping of James Foster. He writes on skysports.com:

The current whisper doing the rounds is that if England play two spinners in the first Ashes Test at Cardiff, it is going to be Swann and Rashid. Time will tell if that is the case but if it is so, then it won't bode well for Monty Panesar's career plan because you'd have to think that there is more to come from Rashid. Similarly, James Foster is in the public eye now too. Everyone's talking about his glove-work and Matt Prior will be thinking 'I'm under pressure when I come back'. Foster's glove-work is exceptional - it has been for five years; every time I've watched him I've been of the mind that he is head-and-shoulders above every other wicketkeeper in English cricket behind the stumps.

England need to heed lessons for their Twenty20 future, especially with regard to their fielding and middle-order batting, Stephen Brenkley writes in the Independent.

Defending champions India failed to make it to the World Twenty20 semi-finals and the blame game has begun, with many questioning MS Dhoni's captaincy. Ayaz Memon writes in the Daily News & Analysis that the team needs some fixing, not crucifixion, for a quick recovery.

It is not that an entire set of quality young players has suddenly forgotten how to play, or that the Indian captain -- till yesterday regarded a whiz at man-management and understanding game situations -- has suddenly become a twit. That's a cop-out explanation. There is much that has gone wrong in this tournament but Twenty20 cricket, as we should know, can also be gloriously or agonisingly topsy-turvy as the IPL showed emphatically.

In his column in the Hindustan Times Sunil Gavaskar asks whether there is anyone better who can replace Dhoni? Dhoni is young and is still learning the trade, so he will get it wrong sometimes, he writes.

According to Bobili Vijay Kumar in the Times of India Dhoni is trying to temper his batting improve his defenses and evolve as a complete batsman and that is not working.

India have suffered due to his quiet ways in the middle, in at least two games. The dot balls have ensured that the team invariably fell short of a few runs. There are, no doubt, a few other reasons too: the absence of Sehwag, and his blistering starts at the top; the ineffectiveness of Ishant with the ball and even lack of cohesion within the team.

	Audacious is the name of the game © Getty Images

As we saw when Broad and Ryan Sidebottom bowled the final two overs of the match knowing that 12 balls were all that stood between India and the 28 runs the defending champions needed to avoid elimination, Twenty20 is making stringent technical demands on its players. The classic requirement of a sound technique with bat or ball is no longer enough. Now, with every delivery carrying significance, the players need to be endlessly adaptable and audacious, inventing their responses to meet the demands of the moment.

The empty seats at the Lord's pavilion just highlight the snobbery of the MCC members, who still continue to believe Twenty20 is hit-and-giggle cricket, Tim de Lisle writes in the Times.

The game had everything - except a full house. The stands were packed, but on the white benches of the world-famous pavilion there were wide empty spaces. Usually on big-match days, MCC members have to get in early and bag a seat with a newspaper. On Sunday the newspaper could have had a seat of its own. MCC has 18,000 full members, all supposedly united by a love of cricket. Yet only a few hundred bothered to attend the biggest match so far in a vibrant tournament. What was going on? They can't all have been at evensong.

The Times' Mike Atherton looks at England's crucial match against India at Lord's and says Kevin Pietersen has been a bellwether for their fortunes in the ICC World Twenty20.

Some day, England will win a match in which Pietersen plays a minor part. At that point, once they have kicked their addiction to an over-reliance on him, we will know that they are a force in the one-day game.

In the Independent, Stephen Brenkley says Ryan Sidebottom earned redemption as improbably, nervously, deservedly, England defeated India by three runs.

Derek Pringle believes James Foster has been quick to seize his big opportunity in the tournament, and that his stumping of Yuvraj Singh will have done his Test credentials no harm. He writes in the Daily Telegraph that while Foster hasn't shone with the bat, England fans will be grateful that he persuaded England's selectors he could get useful Twenty20 runs.

India may have faltered against the West Indies, but Yuvraj Singh poses a grave threat to England's World Twenty20 hopes, says Steve James in the Daily Telegraph. In defeat on Friday night Yuvraj was sublime, and he rather likes England. There were those famous six sixes in an over off Stuart Broad in South Africa in 2007, England’s sole Twenty20 encounter with India.

Vic Marks writes in the Observer that England will be relying on Kevin Pietersen for runs against India, but the bowlers will also need to do their bit for victory.

The mavericks of Sri Lanka are putting a unique stamp on Twenty20 with their endless capacity for reinvention, writes John Stern in the Sunday Times. Sri Lankan cricket seems to encourage invention and innovation to a point where it is almost unconventional to be conventional.

Ajantha Mendis' stats are frightening: 34 Test wickets at 23; 64 one-day wickets at 13; 16 Twenty20 international wickets at seven and 155 first-class wickets at 16. Strike-rates and economy-rates are all more than acceptable. In the age of the batsman, these are throwback numbers, the sort of figures one would expect from the days of uncovered pitches.

The fiasco surrounding Virender Sehwag's injury and his absence from the World Twenty20, as embarassing as it proved for the Indian team, was further intensified by the manner in which it was dealt by sections of the Indian media, writes Pradeep Magazine in the Hindustan Times.

To lend the whole drama a theatrical touch has been Mahendra Singh Dhoni’s holier than thou attitude, where he parades the entire team and even the support staff in front of the media to prove that all is well with his world. He even has a skirmish with a TV reporter but such is his clout, power and popularity that no one dares to criticise him.

In the end, Sehwag has to not just contend with the fact that he may not be able to play cricket for a few months, but also deal with a very hostile media.

The Guardian's Mike Selvey is of the opinion that Twenty20 has found its place courtesy of phenomenal athleticism and invention. Since Twenty20 began as an ­English midsummer diversion, says Selvey, its rise has been little short of remarkable.Explosive hitting had started to permeate the game, but it was the ICC World Twenty20 in 2007 that was a major landmark.

In the Independent Stephen Brenkley says England are ill-equipped to make a lasting impact in Twenty20 as India await.

If the players are not skilful enough – and they are not – what does that say about the original Twenty20 championship? The oldest and not the best. None of this will have much bearing on the Ashes but England have missed the opportunity to captivate a new audience. No heroes have been made so far and two of the so-called T20 specialists Rob Key and Graham Napier, have barely had a look in.

Richard Hobson writes in the Times that given the emphasis that England are placing on the value of IPL experience — or lack of it — the absence of Graham Napier so far is surprising.

Also in the Guardian, Paul Weaver questions Sachin Tendulkar and Graham Gooch about how special Ravi Bopara actually is. In Tendulkar's words, Bopara "has the talent to do something special" and Gooch, who spotted Bopara eight years ago at an indoor nets, says he has always been a bubbly character, a cocky, confident outgoing lad and that he is far from the finished product.

England's over-dependence on Kevin Pietersen is looking really unhealthy and the inconsistency is glaring. If the blasters at the top of the order fail, what next? The ammunition is thin on the ground and a collective headlessness sets in, writes Ian Chadband in the Telegraph. He takes the example of England's sorry effort against South Africa.

The theatre surrounding the man here was irresistible as usual. When Ravi Bopara went in the first over, it was almost a surprise to see Pietersen striding to the wicket. Striding? After hearing his own melodramatic versions recently of his injury woes, surely the mighty one would hobble out there on a Zimmer frame.

Still, as he is never slow in letting us know, he is a man who knows no fear and no pain. He’d played before with a damaged back, broken ribs, a broken hand; and, of course, many times with a broken team.

In the Times, Simon Wilde makes a strong case for either India or South Africa to lift the World Twenty20, but his heart goes out to a team which needs the trophy more than the rest - Pakistan. The traumatic events in Lahore and the isolation that followed will all be forgotten, at least temporarily, if they can perform against the odds.

It would be in keeping with their mercurial character if the Pakistanis now began to play with real magic. They have a good record at Twenty20 and are in much the easier Super Eight group. A semi-final spot is a genuine possibility - and then, who knows what?

Australia's surprise exit has proved that players who are very good in one form need not necessarily be as effective in another. There is a school of thought, and one that has some strength to it, that a good player will be good in any form, but looking at some of theAustralians, you wondered if they had made the adjustment, writes Harsha Bhogle in the Indian Express.

One of the things we learnt from the IPL was that great players in the traditional formats put a price on their wicket and consolidate when things go wrong when sadly, there is neither the time nor often a sound reason to consolidate. Maybe that is where a Ponting or a Hussey haven’t allowed the learning curve to set in. In the absence of Symonds, their best T20 batsman is probably David Hussey but he saw six others bat ahead of him.

Dave Tickner, in his blog on Cricket365.com, says the World Twenty20 has, so far, been an enormous hit except for the forgivable blips of the farcical opening ceremony and the ridiculously attired cheerleaders.

We're halfway through the tournament already with the excitement only set to rise over the second week as we race towards the business end of the event.

'Leave them wanting more' is a maxim rarely heard inside the ICC, but international Twenty20 cricket has been allowed to remain a rarity, a treat.

The tournament is the perfect length, and other international T20 contests are rare enough that the format retains novelty at this level and avoids the fate of 50-over cricket.

Vikas Singh, in his blog in the Times of India, says MS Dhoni's handling of the fiasco surrounding Virender Sehwag's injury represents his first major misstep as India's captain.

Why was the usually articulate captain so reluctant to comment about the fitness of his deputy and one of the team's proven match-winners? That remark only added to the impression that something was amiss. So several publications, including The Times of India, carried articles saying as much.

If that interpretation was incorrect, Dhoni simply had to issue a denial. It would certainly have been reported. Instead, he needlessly upped the ante by getting the entire Indian team to turn up at a press conference and proclaim its unity. That was certainly a dramatic statement to make. But the problem with such grandstanding is that if it backfires, it can leave its architect red-faced.

Kiwi blogger Paul Holden is relishing the early exit of the Australians from the World Twenty20. Read him on the Sideline Slogger blog.

There is a rare joy for a Kiwi in seeing the Australian cricket team get thumped twice in a matter of days. It may be perverse, it may be irrational, it may be hurtful, it may be immature, it may be un-Australian - but it does feel good to see the previously all-conquering Australians return to the pack of international cricket.

After crashing out four days into the tournament, Australia's most pressing task is uncovering the attractions of Leicester (where they are expected to spend the next couple of weeks), says David Hopps in the Guardian.

Giles Smith is amazed at the speed with which a team's fortunes fluctuate in the World Twenty20, and at fans' "notoriously twitchy attention spans". In a hilarious tongue-in-cheek piece in the Times he wonders whether the organisers are concerned that the crowd's attention will slide because of the long national anthems before each match.

And how are they going to stop the audience at home visiting the fridge or deciding to throw it all in and go on YouTube instead? ... It's a genuine worry. Which is why we propose the composing, as soon as possible, of special, shorter format, Twenty20 versions of the anthems. Just a couple of bars from the verse and a chorus, say. Or (still more in keeping) just replace them all with another quick blast of James Brown's I Feel Good - get the job done and then on with the cricket. And then off with the cricket, as short a time as possible later. It makes sense

In only one respect was England's victory over Pakistan fortunate and that was that England came up against the one team who had looked even rustier than themselves in the warm-up games, writes Mike Atherton in the Times.

Pakistan’s fielding was horrific and reflected a team short on cricket and confidence. Pakistan’s supporters drifted away long before the end, followed by the inevitable “Are you England in disguise?” As the Netherlands showed, anyone can win a Twenty20 match, and to the relief of the ECB and its marketing department, last night belonged emphatically to England.

Kevin Pietersen is the diva of cricket, Paul Weaver writes in the Guardian. It is not enough that he is respected; he demands to be loved too. He probably had it inserted in his recently drafted central contract. And how the crowd adored him here last night.

Pietersen has been bleeding lately and his blood has marked all our clothes. He has been bleeding since the start of the year, when the captaincy was torn from him. King Lear, who was mad, demanded love from his daughters; Pietersen, it seems, insists it is forthcoming from every­one and his performances feed from that affection.

In the Observer, Will Buckley goes behind the scenes at the MCC at Lord's on the opening day of the World Twenty20.

After the naps were powered there was a sense of disappointment in the Library. "Which Royal have we got?" asked one Member. "The Duke of Kent," replied another. "Jesus." The aura of low key persisted when it was announced: "The opening ceremony has been abandoned for safety reasons." This drew a few groans, but I think a useful precedent has been set for 2012.

In the Library, meanwhile, a Member, who had earlier opened a grand window, decided to sing along to the National Anthem. He got as far as "Gracious Queen" before heavy stares forced him to desist. It was agreed that the Dutch effort was "lovely".

Tony Cozier, writing in the Stabroek News, while acknowledging that Twenty20 cricket remains the game of the present, says Test cricket's continued survival despite competition from different versions of the sport is an achievement in itself.

It all adds to the appeal of the sport but it is accompanied by a general concern over the impact of such rapid expansion on Test cricket, for 132 years the bedrock of the game.

There is widespread doubt that it can survive the counter-attraction of latest development to its long-held primacy. It is increasingly seen as an anachronism in an age that has no time for a leisurely pursuit extending to five days, six hours a day.

Neil Manthorp, writing on the Supersport website, says the cricketing public in England has taken to the World Twenty20 quite well, despite the frustrating weather and the home team's dismal loss in the tournament opener.

It was still only 11.00am, an hour after the scheduled start of the New Zealand-Scotland match, but Dads were grimly and determindly sipping their first pint of beer - duty called. The difference to most such occasions was that their children were with them. There were children everywhere, completely unburdened by the weather and unperturbably thrilled by the prospect of seeing international cricket - at some point - while they sat cross-legged under the rafters munching the cheese and pickle sandwiches packed for two hours later.

English cricket has plumbed some pretty low depths in its time but defeat by Pakistan would surely set a new level of ignominy that may not be beaten until the Afghans, or Eskimos, visit Lord’s, writes Simon Wilde in Sunday Times.

Pakistan have been deprived of so much cricket of late because of the security crisis surrounding their country and they are simply grateful to be back in the thick of the action again. They are also rebuilding their side and possess some gifted teenagers who won’t die wondering. Twenty20 cricket is for daredevils and risk-taking isn’t in the Anglo-Saxon genes. Without Kevin Pietersen and Graeme Swann, England played a cautious game, while the Dutch were bold and brave.

	Stuart Braod should tell himself that in the final moments of England's humiliation, he did nothing wrong © Getty Images

Where did it all go wrong for England last night? Questions must be asked initially about team selection. With Kevin Pietersen unavailable through injury, the selectors had the perfect opportunity to stiffen an already thin bowling line-up and substitute Pietersen’s firepower by bringing in Graham Napier or Dimitri Mascarenhas. They did neither, replacing Pietersen with Robert Key, who after England’s bright start was demoted in the order and came in late on precisely when a big hitter was needed. Mascarenhas should have played.

Why was England's middle order replete with players possessing no power of stroke, asks David Hopps in the Guardian.

Broad will wonder how victory eluded England. He should tell himself that in the final moments of their humiliation, he did nothing wrong. His reliance on a round-the-wicket approach to the right-hander, slanting the ball across, worked like a dream. All that happened was that he did not get the breaks.

In the same paper, Mike Selvey writes that for Twenty20 the coaching manual has been torn asunder and a new one drawn up for the modern age that would have had The Don blanching.

True to their footballing cousins, the Dutch played total cricket, a brand that mixed equally the lusty slogs of the village blacksmith with subtler shots of the Pro cricketer, of which there are four in this side, writes Derek Pringle in the Telegraph.

The Netherlands have only 5,000 cricketers and that includes the women who play the game, so this was a massive humiliation for England despite Twenty20's ability to make fools of the favourites, and despite the last ball finish.

On cricinfo.com, Andrew Miller writes that England got exactly what they deserved as they dared to treat a global tournament as a side-show.

Tomorrow at Lord's Paul Collingwood will lead England into the first match of the World Twenty20, a second coming for him in the role and one regained perhaps reluctantly and probably by default. This time around, he, if not his team, might just thrive, writes Mike Selvey in the Guardian.

It is almost certainly that brief time spent with the IPL in South Africa – rather than any overwhelming ambition or belief that, as he is over the trauma that affected his Test career, it is fine to resume the role that contributed to the trauma – which has convinced him that there would be no harm in leading the side again for what is a very limited period of time in any case. This will be more a working holiday than an encumbrance.

In the same paper Kevin Mitchell daydreams about how it would be if an England player gave as his prediction of the upcoming series with Australia, "Five-nil England – unless it rains".

It was Glenn McGrath's serial wind-up – with his own team replacing England of course – and it came painfully true in Australia in 2007, but I would back Ravi Bopara some time soon to mouth those cheeky words. Three Test centuries in a row did much for the Essex batsman's confidence, but they did even more for that of the selectors. They now believe in Bopara as much as he does himself. If he gets in the face of Brett Lee and Mitchell Johnson – the only language they understand – anything is possible.

To Mike Atherton in the Times Dirk Nannes, who will spearhead Netherlands' attack in the World Twenty20, is something of a throwback to a time when sport could accommodate men with a varied hinterland, who were not prepared to be suffocated by the blinkered demands of professionalism.

Now it would be impossible for a precociously talented schoolboy to play two leading sports at the highest level because they are funnelled down a specialist path sooner than ever before. Football academies suck in the most talented at 9 years old and spit most out at 16. Cricket is a 12-month option for the brightest and best schoolboys. Eating, drinking and sleeping cricket is the order of the day at academies, which excludes those who would rather dabble at other things for a while, or indeed the late developers.

Lawrence Booth, in his blog The Spin in the Guardian, tries to figure out why England have faltered in limited-overs cricket since the early 90's.

For the rest of the time since England reached the last of their three World Cup finals 17 years ago, their one-day form in global competitions has veered from laughable to execrable with a bit of abominable thrown in for good measure. No playwright could have combined comedy, tragedy and farce more seamlessly.

Paul Weaver, also writing in the Guardian, spells out some of the reasons for Robert Key's selection in England's World Twenty20 squad, despite the batsman not being in the best touch.

He was always popular in the dressing room, especially with Andrew Flintoff and Steve Harmison, which may not have met with the former coach Duncan Fletcher's complete approval, and he had a nous for the game. Indeed, essentially a championship player, he reinvented himself as a batsman when he became captain of Kent in 2006 to embrace changes within the game.

Meanwhile, Nitin Naik, writing in the Times of India, feels the World Twenty20 offers an excellent opportunity for cricket to regain its popularity in England after the euphoria of the Ashes win in 2005 faded significantly.

The IPL has a set a benchmark for entertaining cricket and according to Amrit Mathur in the Hindustan Times, the World Twenty20 is unlikely to match its buzz and hype.

There is no denying that the World Cup is a major event which features the best talent. But it also has sub-standard teams and mediocre players who drag down quality. Ireland versus Bangladesh might be attractive for the ICC but for a fan it is enough reason to reach for the TV remote and switch channels. The reason for the IPL's stunning success is that it produces top quality cricket, and is intensely competitive. The Kolkata Knight Riders may not have finished at the top but,on any given day, are capable of defeating the other seven sides and are stronger than half a dozen teams in the World Cup.

Dylan Cleaver in the New Zealand Herald provides 20 things to look out for at this year's World Twenty20 for all those who pretend they're not interested.

Chris Gayle

Now he's declared his love for T20, the Coolest Man on the Planet would do well to spread that amore. No better player to watch when the muse strikes.

Covers

It is, after all, being played in England, in June.

Ross Taylor

Despite being criminally ignored by Bangalore until the later rounds, he emerged as one of the more explosive batsmen going around - but we knew that anyway.

The recent predecessors to the World Twenty20 in England were the World Cup in 1999 and the Champions Trophy in 2004 - both damp squibs.There is genuine reason to believe that this time the organisers will get it right and that they will produce a competition which is engaging, entertaining and of its era: part sport, part showbiz, writes Stephen Brenkley in the Independent on Sunday.

Instead of muddling through, they hired Steve Elworthy as tournament director, after his success in a similar role at the World Twenty20 in South Africa two years ago. He intends to get things right from the start. There is no opening ceremony of the shabby kind which got the event a decade ago off to a laughable start from which it never recovered. There will be an opening presentation, short, sharp, spectacular in a low-key fashion. Elworthy cannot guarantee two things which would help in making this World Twenty20 successful: the weather and a decent run by the host nation. With the usual caveats, it seems the first of those wishes will be met and that the sun will indeed shine. The second is much trickier, although at least England have two chances. For the first time in any major team sport, a men's championship is being run alongside that for women. While England's men have been undergoing their usual rollercoaster ride and have been careering towards the ground in Twenty20, the women's team have taken all before them. As world champions in the 50-over format, they have a copper-bottomed chance of further triumph. If England perform as well as expected, they will make a breakthrough into the public consciousness never seen before.

The Observer's Andy Bull writes that the World Twenty20 will be a test of the public's continuing hunger for the game.

There are no £1.50 tickets this time, with prices for the final as high as £90. Still, the matches are being staged in pairs, back-to-back, so if anyone does get momentarily bored, it's no worry. Another match, another six, another wicket will be along soon enough.

There is some concern that the IPL would have left the Indian players jaded but the team will have a fairly easy time after the World Twenty20, and will be keen to give it their best. Sunil Gavaskar in the Hindustan Times believes fatigue shouldn’t be a worry for India in the tournament beginning on Friday in England.

He also goes on to talk about plugging the loopholes which ensure a player can turn out for another country after he finds there's no place for him in the national squad despite good performances.

The challenge for India this time is bigger, if not tougher. Lalchand Rajput, who was coach during the triumph at the inaugural World Twenty20 recalls his strategy and planning - in particular, the K.I.S.S. formula - Keep It Super Simple, in the Times of India. His message was: Don’t complicate things and take each game at a time.

...We were riding on the disaster of the West Indies World Cup, so I told the boys that a win would be special.

I gave the example of Edmund Hillary. ‘He was the first to climb the Everest but even today he is remembered first despite many others having scaled the peak. Try to achieve a similar feat, and if you believe, you will’ I told the boys.

Defending champions India seem to be favourites for the World Twenty20 in England and Harsha Bhogle feels though the tag can be a poisoned chalice, India do seem to possess the right kind of players. He writes in the Indian Express:

The ideal way to go about it is to have five batsmen, a keeper and a batting all-rounder in the top 7. If there is a second batting all-rounder in that mix, it is even better. No 8 must necessarily be a bowling all-rounder and of the three bowlers, one should be able to bat. India’s top seven are well served on this parameter with Sehwag, Gambhir, Raina, Yuvraj, Rohit Sharma, Dhoni and Yusuf Pathan. Irfan Pathan must be No 8 and with Harbhajan likely to get in, the batting looks like it has enough to counter most situations.

New Zealand's players may not exactly have been on top form during the IPL, but Dylan Cleaver thinks there's cause for optimism ahead of the World Twenty20 next month. He writes in the New Zealand Herald:

Because the shorter the format, the more even the competition ... Because McCullum, undoubtedly New Zealand's key player, rediscovered his form after weeks of futility. Because Dan Vettori will give you four overs of quality spin. And because Ross Taylor can bat with a strike rate of 200 when the muse strikes.

	Stuart Broad and Yuvraj Singh laugh it off after batsman hit bowler for six sixes in an over © Getty Images

London-based sports psychologist Victor Thompson explains. "The main risk is that the bowler will interpret the sixes as evidence that he has failed as a bowler," he says. According to the sports psychologist, a bowler should focus on the challenge and not the threat of the situation to prevent from crumbling psychologically.

"He should analyse his delivery and look for ways to test and beat the batsman. He must keep his body language confident and positive: upright, purposeful, chest high. He should also recall similar situations before where he has had success and shown grit against a challenging batsman. Other techniques can also help but these can give most bowlers a boost," Thompson says in an email interview.

Florida-based performance psychologist John F Murray compares the event to a pitcher getting hammered in baseball. "The effect depends entirely on a player’s experience, self-confidence, maturity and resilience. If a player is high in these factors then catastrophic failure has little effect and the player usually recovers well and may even return with increased confidence and focus," he says.

	The future of Indian cricket belongs to cricketers with young and willing legs and arms and uncluttered minds © Getty Images

The Hindu says that it is clear the future of Indian cricket belongs to cricketers with young and willing legs and arms and uncluttered minds. But it warns against the success being blown out of proportion.

There are two clear messages from South Africa for the Board of Control for Cricket in India. The first is that the time may be just right to consider easing out the old guard. The other is that the BCCI must not allow this Twenty20 triumph to lead to a slow cannibalisation of Test cricket.

The Times of India calls for a celebration of diversity that defines this young Indian side.

The Hindustan Times observes that the changing face of Indian cricket reflects a deeper social and political transformation that the country has gone through.

Most sociologists would see this as confirmation of the rise of small-town India: to the multi-storey malls in Rohtak, you can now add the residence of Joginder Sharma. This is the India for whom playing cricket is a vehicle of social mobility, of finally unshackling an oppressive system where the public school tie appeared to matter more than ability. With its uniquely meritocratic approach, cricket could do what few other fields of activity in this country provided: a chance to excel and be recognised, irrespective of one’s lineage.

But it cautions against vieweing cricketers as catalysts of social change.

Don’t forget the euphoria of the 1983 win was followed by the horrific anti-Sikh riots just a year later. 2007 may be a watershed moment in Indian cricket, but beyond the boundary life isn’t quite so smooth.

Peter Roebuck began the tournament as a Twenty20 sceptic. Since then he has discovered that the format has much to offer, as he explains in the Age.

Arguably, Twenty20 is better in small doses but it has stated its case impressively and now must be part and parcel of the program. Apart from anything else, helped by a notably cheerful commentary team, it makes entertaining television.

Jon Pierik writes in the Herald Sun that the way India celebrated their triumph was proof Twenty20 matters.

There is no time to think, just do what comes naturally. Veteran commentator and former England batsman David Lloyd went as a far as describing the celebrations as unprecedented on a cricket field. This sheer delight in winning a tournament most people dismissed can only be a good thing for a sport that hasn't had much to cheer about recently.

	The competition has been packaged as any fast food should be: attractively presented for rapid consumption and instant gratification with no pretensions © Getty Images

After the end to an exciting inaugural World Twenty20, Mike Haysman – always a fan of the format – says it’s time for change in his article in SuperCricket.

The ICC can no longer ignore the popularity of the shortest form and needs to accommodate the wishes of their fanatical paying public. This injection is exactly what the game needs to rejuvenate the sport and whilst Test cricket needs to be protected and preserved, the relatively sluggish 50 over game can step aside and allow the new pretender centre stage.

Fazeer Mohammed, writing in the Trinidad and Tobago Express, seems to agree.

From the pulsating curtain-raiser at the Wanderers between South Africa and the West Indies to today's final matching India against Pakistan at the same venue, this tournament has spanned all of two weeks, including two rest days either side of Saturday's semi-finals. Compared to the attention-sapping two-month duration of the last two World Cup events - the International Cricket Council's flagship tournament - the competition has been packaged as any fast food should be: attractively presented for rapid consumption and instant gratification with no pretensions towards the proper nutrition that is needed to sustain the long-term health of the traditional form of the game.

A column in the Indian Express suggests that Twenty20 is not a dumbing down of the game.

Contrary to fears that cricket matches are becoming mindless slog-fests, T20 intensifies scrutiny of the game. Every delivery matters, every shot, every catch, every dive. With such little scope to make amends, freeloaders are caught out immediately.

Remember John Wright’s wry observation that the way limited-overs cricket was headed, any day now all eleven players would be picked for their batting. Most teams already go into ODIs with just four regular bowlers, even three. T20 has reversed that. The last fortnight in South Africa has shown that amongst well-matched teams the fifth bowler matters.

A new-look Indian team has emerged in the format that’s been a hit the world over, says Somini Sengupta in the New York Times.

Not only was the game different, but the team was unlike those past. Its members played fast and furious. They danced victoriously on the cricket pitch. At news conferences, they spoke Hinglish, a mongrel of Hindi and English that has become the lingua franca of the young small-town Indian.

Although Pakistan may have lost the final, Kamran Abbasi in the Dawn says it was cricket that was the winner at the Wanderers. He also feels that it's a great start for the newcomers at the helm of the Pakistan team.

There is no shame in this defeat even though it might be at the hands of Pakistan’s biggest rivals. Malik and Lawson have revived Pakistan as a force in world cricket. It is an era begun with energy, passion, discipline and much excitement.

"The South African cricket team are not a bunch of chokers. We know, because they tell us so," writes Michael Doman on Independent Online. "Yet on Thursday night in Durban they were rudely dumped out of the World Twenty20 by India when they buckled under the pressure of having to chase a victory target of 154 in 20 overs."

The other cry in the wake of South Africa's demise is: Where was Jacques Kallis when needed. Not selected in the squad... and in hindsight perhaps this was a mistake. The people are impatient for success. Yet remember that two of Saturday's semifinalists, India and Pakistan, did not make it past the first round of the 2007 World Cup.

	Rohit Sharma - Next in line © AFP

Rohit Sharma has been talked about for long in Mumbai cricket circles and it was only a matter of time before the whole country would sit up and take notice of him. After his match-winning 50 against South Africa which helped India advance to the semi-finals, his family spent a sleepless night, and they were hardly complaining. Read the full piece in Rediff.

The telephone would not stop ringing and the 15 people assembled in Dinesh Lad's room at Star Line building Gorai in the far suburbs of Mumbai couldn't believe that the boy next door had made it big.

Also read Sandeep Dwivedi's article in the Indian Express.

But Sharma’s friends keep it simple as they can’t stop speaking about last night’s ‘kadak’ knock. They speak fondly about Indian cricket’s newest star, who hasn’t changed a bit and still constantly keeps in touch with them. No doubt, Sharma groaned about his cell phone bill to a journalist recently and asked him to keep in touch through mail.

Soumya Bhattacharya writes in the Hindustan Times why Twenty20 doesn't seem like cricket to him.

It appears to be not so much a speeded-up, watered-down version of cricket, a sort of cricket-lite for dummies who are incapable of comprehending the complexities and subtleties of the greatest game in the world, but an utter impostor. It has whittled away at cricket’s essence; it has snuffed out its soul; it is unrecognisable as the game I adore.

Big hits are nothing new, but in his column for the Guardian Mike Selvey says cricket's overdoing it a bit too much. Getting closer to the matter, Selvey's view is that new lightweight bats mean limited-overs cricket is in danger of turning into a predictable slogarama.

There is some phenomenal ball-striking taking place, the size of some of the boundaries notwithstanding. Before Yuvraj Singh's outrageous six sixes in an over off Stuart Broad yesterday, the longest hits so far, presumably measured by laser, have been belted by Pakistan's Misbah ul-Haq off Australia's Nathan Bracken, stunning 111-metre front foot drives both. These, and many of the numerous maximums hit this past week or so, have been the result of perfect striking and supreme confidence; six anywhere, anytime. The bats don't half help, though; these disposable lightweight lumps of willow, all volume and no density. It is these characteristics that still bother me.

Writing in the Hindu, Steve Waugh hopes Mahendra Singh Dhoni's appointment as ODI captain doesn't detract from India's task at hand - qualifying for the semi-finals of the ICC World Twenty20.

Waugh also feels the Australians are taking time to come to grips with the Twenty20 format, and seem to be caught between wanting to play the way they do in 50-over cricket and trying to innovate.

Australia's insistence on using Michael Clarke and Andrew Symonds as their spinners, rather than the specialist Brad Hogg, is hurting them significantly at the ICC World Twenty20, as Peter Roebuck explains in the Sydney Morning Herald.

As the Pakistanis rattled along, Adam Gilchrist must have wished he had Brad Hogg's more potent brew at his disposal. Arguably, Hogg's batting was also missed as the tailenders swished away like a drunken headmaster. Not that it was easy for the Australians to change a team that has been serving them well. Nevertheless, spin has been to the foremost in this Twenty20. As with the film industry, it is often written off but refuses to die. Not for the first time, Daniel Vettori has been as dangerous as any paceman.

	"Why, oh why, KP, couldn't you have kept your trap shut?" © Getty Images

Convincing as Twenty20 cricket has become, it would be dangerous for the game to lose sight of the advantages that are still clear in 50-over cricket, writes Mark Nicholas in the Daily Telegraph.

Twenty20 is exciting because it is condensed. It is the natural heir to the 40-over cricket that quickly established itself in the late Sixties as the "new black" – hip, fast, accessible and satisfying. Previously unseen audiences were as seduced then as they are now. Forty years on, it is obvious to everyone except the people who run the game in England day-to-day, that the 40-over format is a white elephant. In fact, it is more dangerous than that. It is an energy sapper, an injury-sucker and a diversion from the accepted formats that are played everywhere else in the world.

Nicholas also requests Kevin Pietersen to stop bleating and just get on with his game.

In the same publication, Mike Atherton says that Twenty20 cricket is a threat to the game's future. Atherton's view is that the appetite for Twenty20 is insatiable, and he's ready to lay a large wager that eventually 50-over cricket will be rendered extinct as a result.

James Lawton shares similar views in his column in the Independent.

Twenty20 is not cricket. It does not have growth, that sublime building of skill and concentration and timing which makes the Test game so ultimately intriguing – nor much of the declining, but sometimes still visible, fundamental qualities of the game which are offered down the food chain until, as in the crudest making of an omelette, the eggs are smashed in the version which is now having imposed upon it, in another money-grubbing lunge, the dignity of a world title.

In the process, cricket uses up its prime talent with the profligacy of a doomed punter chasing from one casino to another.

Over in the Times, David Fulton feels England's top sports stars are resorting to the blandest of platitudes. Fulton too criticises Pietersen's call to "humiliate" Australia by knocking them out of the World Twenty20 - which backfired spectacularly, by the way - and wonders how KP felt it would somehow serve as an act of revenge for the Ashes whitewash.

It has only taken a week for Peter Roebuck to soften his anti-Twenty20 stance. He explains in the Sydney Morning Herald that although he is not yet a convert, he now understands that some good can come from the shortest format of the game.

Above all, the tournament has maintained its momentum. Thankfully, the ICC learnt from the mistakes made in the last long-winded World Cup. Matches have been rattling along so that interest has not wavered. Tickets have been cheap, $4 in the popular areas, and no attempt has been made to dampen spirits. To the contrary, music has been encouraged as well as silly costumes and amusing antics.

Robert Craddock, writing in the Courier-Mail, still has significant reservations.

I find it's like watching that old 1960s television show Combat (with Vic Morrow) where people got shot up at the rate of 100 deaths per minute. Eventually you get to the stage where you go "Oh, another one, anything else happening?" It doesn't push my buttons but you simply have to accept that cricket needs it.

With the ICC Twenty20 seemingly a hit with the spectators unlike the tedious World Cup in the Caribbean, Michael Atherton ponders the implications for 50-over cricket in The Sunday Telegraph. He says the announcement of the Champions League and the 25% increase in number of Twenty20 games in the next English county season are a portent of things to come.

The appetite for Twenty20 is insatiable. While all eyes have focused on South Africa, there were two developments elsewhere which suggest that eventually Twenty20 cricket could well become the dominant form of the game. I'd certainly lay a large wager that eventually 50-over cricket will be rendered extinct.

Australia were beaten by a younger, fitter, brighter Zimbabwe outfit on Wednesday, according to Peter Roebuck in the Sydney Morning Herald.

The Aussies looked leaden. Not so long ago, Matthew Hayden and Adam Gilchrist dominated a World Cup campaign. Here, they lost their wickets to poorly executed back-foot shots. Having played practice matches on firmer pitches, none of the Australians timed the ball sweetly, especially off the back foot. Ponting himself played an awful shot, a slog sweep that merely made matters worse. Perhaps the Australians had watched the opening match and thought every ball had to be dispatched into the stands. Certainly the batsmen did not adjust their games to meet the conditions. None of the Australian batsmen played county cricket this winter, and it showed.

Australia’s players weren’t the only ones looking sheepish after the match. Adam Hamilton writes in the Herald Sun that punters around the world lost tens of millions of dollars because of the upset.

"When the Aussies got into $1.01 we still matched more than $400,000. That's the shortest odds possible," Betfair’s Hugh Taggart said. "What's even more staggering is that a further $2.8 million was matched at $1.02. It's safe to assume there's more interest in Twenty20 than we first thought."

Writing in the Sydney Morning Herald, Peter Roebuck says he can't be content with Twenty20 given the nature of the format.

Satisfaction was lacking. Twenty20 tolerates batting without consequence. It is a slogathon. None of the subtleties of the game were seen, the speculations in the stands, the mid-pitch debates. Everyone is a hitter.

	© Getty Images

One commentator noted that now everyone knew why the Australian national side was banned by its government from coming to Zimbabwe for a one-day international series this month.

Zimbabwe had won the hearts of the crowd for their commitment in all departments and it was no surprise that virtually everyone waited for their chance to congratulate the victorious players who went on a victory lap. The electronic scoreboard stayed with the message "Congratulations Zimbabwe" for the night.

Perhaps fortunately, the result came too late for today’s Australian papers, but tomorrow’s are unlikely to be too forgiving to Ricky Ponting’s side.

David Hopps in The Guardian notes:

It was also an embarrassing start for Tim Nielsen, Australia's new coach, whose side were 50-1 on favourites, but who looked unprepared both physically and mentally. They had practiced on the featherbed pitches of Johannesburg and entirely failed to adapt to the more hostile conditions in Cape Town.

In The Daily Telegraph, Simon Briggs says it was down to preparation.

Beset by political troubles, Zimbabwe have suspended themselves voluntarily from Test cricket indefinitely. There are many within the sport who believe they should not be allowed to compete at all until the tyrant Robert Mugabe is deposed. But whatever the real-world backdrop, this team have clearly prepared themselves with great efficiency for this tournament. Their bowling was disciplined, and their batting cool-headed.

In case you hadn't noticed, there's a World Cup going on. Well, there are two but on this site we'd better stick with the cricket one. So here's a link to the TV ads that have been publicising the campaign for the last four or five weeks in South Africa – and, just like the competition, they've been very well received by the public.

South Africans have also really taken to the domestic version, the Pro20, and our South African colleague Keith Lane tells us he's not seen an empty Wanderers for the four internationals played there.

Nearly time for kick-off, then, but in the meantime enjoy the ads.

	Expect a real carnival in South Africa this September © AFP

The first Twenty20 World Championship should be the most watchable 'global' cricket event for a decade. It can hardly fail to be. Recent World Cups have been dire because they have comprised far too many countries and therefore far too many mis-matches, while every Champions Trophy has proved a non-event. Such is the appeal that Tuesday's opening game between South Africa and West Indies and the final are sell-outs; and three-quarters of seats overall have been sold, albeit at knock-down prices, the lesson of the last World Cup having been learned.

Simon Wilde is of the same seniment as he previews the the tournament in the Times.

This event should be everything the one in the Caribbean was not – and therefore hasten the march towards 20-over cricket becoming the sport’s dominant short form. At 14 days long rather than 47, it will be blessedly concise.

Ticket prices have been slashed to bring back the masses who were so brutally cold-shouldered at the World Cup. With the most expensive seats for the final on September 24 costing £11 rather than £149, as was the case in Barbados in March, grounds should be full rather than three-quarters empty.

Also read Will Luke's piece on how Twenty20 cricket is true to its roots on cricinfo.com