Cricket is like a religion in Delhi. Well, like the Church of England in the UK, to be precise: a struggling monolith trying to convince an apathetic population to turn up and take part.

That is just Delhi – and it is not quite as bad as all that. There were 25,000 people watching a well-drilled Victoria Bushrangers side mash the Delhi Daredevils last night. But this was a disappointing turn out and the television cameras never concentrated on the waves of empty seats.

According to one Indian journalist, Delhi is not as cricket-crazy as some other parts of the country. The Feroz Shah Kotla stadium has an ugly beauty about it, especially now the colourful Champions League branding has turned it into Little Cricket World – like a cricket section of EuroDisney – but it underwent a refit only five years ago. “It was a pit. No one cared,” the journalist explains.

Add in perceived corruption from administrators, vicious local police and you can understand the roots of this disillusion – at least that’s what I am told.

Then again, that particular journalist is not from Delhi and was not perfectly objective, so I’ll have to take his words with a pinch of salt – or make a leap of faith.

Edward Craig is deputy editor of The Wisden Cricketer