Sixteen teams, eight islands, forty-seven days
The 2007 World Cup was the largest yet staged and the least loved. Sixteen teams played fifty-one matches across the Caribbean over almost seven weeks. Ticket prices were set above what much of the local population could pay, restrictions on what crowds could bring into grounds stripped out a good deal of the noise, and the organisers were publicly criticised by Viv Richards among others. ICC chief executive Malcolm Speed acknowledged the pricing problem and put it on the local organisers. The rules were relaxed as the tournament went on and the later grounds filled up, but the early images of empty stands set the tone.
Five days that emptied the tournament
The cricket did the rest of the damage. On 17 March at Queen's Park Oval, Bangladesh chased 192 to beat India by five wickets. The same day at Sabina Park, Ireland dismissed Pakistan for 132 and won by three wickets under Duckworth-Lewis, having already tied with Zimbabwe two days earlier. India and Pakistan were both out inside the first week. The subcontinental supporters who had funded much of the travel went home, and the Super Eight round lost the fixture it had been built around.
The next morning Bob Woolmer, Pakistan's coach, was found dead in his Kingston hotel room. Jamaican police first treated the death as suspicious and opened a murder investigation, then withdrew that conclusion. An inquest returned an open verdict in November 2007 and the case was closed.
Gilchrist, and then the dark
Australia won every match they played, as they had in 2003. Matthew Hayden made 659 runs. Glenn McGrath took 26 wickets in his last international tournament and was named player of the series. The final at Kensington Oval should have been a straightforward coronation. Rain cut it to thirty-eight overs a side before a ball was bowled. Adam Gilchrist hit 149 from 104, the highest score made in a World Cup final, and Australia reached 281 for 4. Sri Lanka's reply was reduced again, to thirty-six overs, with a revised target of 269.
At the end of the thirty-third over the umpires took the players off for bad light. Australia started celebrating; the minimum twenty overs had been bowled. The umpires then announced, wrongly, that because the stoppage was for light rather than rain the last three overs would have to be played the following day. Sri Lanka needed 61 from 18 balls. Mahela Jayawardene saw no point in returning, Ricky Ponting agreed to use only spinners, and the tournament finished in near-total darkness with nine runs added. The officials apologised afterwards: the match should have been stopped there and awarded to Australia by 37 runs.
Afterwards
Three titles in a row, twenty-nine World Cup matches without defeat, and a tournament almost nobody wanted to defend. The ICC cut the field back to fourteen for 2011 and tightened the schedule.