The final front-rear
I am one for the statistics. I know you would say that statistics can't be parameters for predictions.
- NDTVSports
- Updated: February 06, 2011 06:36 PM IST
I am one for the statistics. I know you would say that statistics can't be parameters for predictions. However my reply would be, that you haven't looked long enough. Exceptions on match-days become statistics in the future. So all this for one question that struck me and nagged me, till I finally answered it, courtesy Wikipedia of course.
So, did you know that the team which has won the world cup has always defeated the same team, if they have met earlier in the tournament? All, except one exception. Well, two abandoned matches too, but then maybe that's the cricket gods' way of keeping this statistic intact.
The more important way of looking at this is that if the finalists have played each other in the tournament earlier too, the result for the finals is more than likely to go the same way as the previous encounter.
Let me give a few examples and you can judge if this actually holds any merit. 1975 - West Indies beat Australia by 7 wickets at The Oval before trouncing them in the final at Lord's a second time by 17 runs.
1979 West Indies and England met for the first time in the finals at Lord's where Viv Richard's century and England's famous 8 wickets for 11 runs collapse handed them a 92-run defeat.
Now the one you've been waiting for. Before beating West Indies by 43 runs in the finals, India had beaten the mighty Caribbeans in the first match of the tournament. Importantly this was the first time West Indies had ever lost a game in the world cup. The teams had met a second time in the group stage when the West Indies had avenged their defeat but the India took the third of the meetings to win their most important match to date. West Indies' two losses to India were their only ones in the first three editions of the world cup.
In 1987, Australia and England met for the first time in the finals coming from different groups.
In 1992, surprise winners Pakistan had only won half their matches to barely scramble through to the last four by virtue of a one point advantage over Australia and West Indies. Now Pakistan hadn't beaten England in the round robin. In fact if the cricket gods wanted to prove me wrong, they would not have done this. Pakistan were bowled out for an astonishing 74. However quoting the famous Delhi band Parikrama's song, 'But it rained'. Pakistan managed to gain a point out of that match, qualified for the semis and managed to beat England the next time they met them, at the MCG for the famous crystal cup.
The 1996 world cup could have easily added to this tally with Sri Lanka being in the form that they were in. However eventual losing finalists Australia forfeited the match due to safety concerns about playing in the island nation.
1999 world cup is the only exception to this statistic, when Australia lost to Pakistan in the group stages by 10 runs before brushing them aside in the finals by 8 wickets with 30 overs to spare.
Come 2003 and we are back in business. India's dream safari had just one exception. The mighty Oz were at the start and the end of it. India lost just two out of 11 matches it played in the tournament. Both times we were given a hammering by Australia, including the finals.
In 2007 Australia beat Sri Lanka by 7 wickets in the super eights before handing out a 53 run defeat in the rain-hit finals to the islanders and the third successive world cup to themselves.
And with that my fellow cricket fans, I rest my case. Now we may never know if it is the pressure or superstition that does it, but it is very difficult to get the monkey off your back once it enters your head.