Sharda UgraWell before the first ball had been hit, the griping began. About the practice facilities, political turmoil, crime rates, logistics, the time taken to get a pizza served in Barbados.What was puzzling was hearing Indian voices in that chorus. Since when did we become super-efficient, clockwork First Worlders and,Sharda UgraWell before the first ball had been hit, the griping began. About the practice facilities, political turmoil, crime rates, logistics, the time taken to get a pizza served in Barbados.What was puzzling was hearing Indian voices in that chorus. Since when did we become super-efficient, clockwork First Worlders and lose our tolerance for chaos?Let’s see how charitable you are when your bags go missing; some will huff and that is valid. But to condemn an event merely because it’s being held somewhere other than factory floor at BMW or Sony, is churlish. It’s just like dissing a subcontinental World Cup on grounds of potholes and remember how mad that makes us.A friend in Melbourne writes that the “revolutionary pool” to be set up in the Rod Laver arena, which usually hosts the Australian Open tennis, has sprung a leak. Besides, ticket sales are sluggish. So what, let’s not give the event a chance and trash it quickly before someone else does?Of course, the West Indies will have surely ensured that wickets and practice facilities are good for the teams, spectators get the seats they have paid for and media’s phone lines are working. They don’t have to be South Africa 2003 because they are not South Africans and they shouldn’t even try to replicate England’s attempted 1999 “carnival”.In any case, the ICC’s events are fast becoming standardised products. All World Cup or a Champions Trophy grounds look almost the same, decked out in identical colours. The good folk in the Caribbean have given up their alcohol-and the right to carry large flags-to matches to stage this Cup. Hopefully, there will be no ban on music or fun and the West Indies will show us how to break free of the McDonaldisation of the World Cup.advertisementOther than worshipping the god of profit, the purpose of a World Cup is to showcase the best and have a sport engage as many different cultures as possible, so that it can eventually call itself truly ‘global’, and not an elitist pursuit. Given that the cost of hosting these mega sports events is now so stratospheric (no opening ceremony is complete without a godzillion dollars worth of fireworks going up in smoke), smaller countries have to really stretch themselves to invite the world in. Let’s not be obnoxious, let’s instead be guests worthy of the invitation and the hospitality.