Early in this World Cup, a conversation with an ICC official articulated one of the motivations for a 10-team tournament at the 2019 edition. It concerned the game's developing nations, but it was less about the opportunities they were afforded than the way they handled tournament play. Many Associates have made a stirring starts to a Cup, the official said, but many had also faded towards the finish of the pool phase.
So it has been for Afghanistan at this tournament. After a strong start, pushing Sri Lanka and then outlasting Scotland, they have indeed lost steam in the closing matches. Hidings at the hands of Australia and New Zealand were perhaps expected, but they were disappointed to be beaten comfortably at the SCG by an England side already eliminated and playing with precious little confidence.
The coach Andy Moles had stated that Afghanistan needed some good fortune and also some poor play from England to sneak a victory in their last appearance of the competition. First of these criteria was not to be fulfilled when Eoin Morgan won a fortunate toss. England could scarcely have ordered better conditions than those they found in Sydney. Overcast skies, a cool temperature and a pitch covered more generously with grass than most strips for this tournament was made to the orders of James Anderson, Stuart Broad, Chris Jordan and Ravi Bopara. There was even a modicum of turn for James Tredwell.
However, the mediocrity of England's bowling was actually noticeable enough that Afghanistan's top order might have made a better fist of the early conditions. While the new ball swung, it was seldom pitched up in the optimum area. Anderson's opening wicket came from a wide half-tracker that Nawroz Mangal could barely reach, while Javed Ahmadi flayed at a Broad ball he might also have left.
Anderson and Broad bowled better after their rare wickets, and Jordan found the right length to extract some movement. Bopara also struck the right length with his wobbling medium pace, while Tredwell was typically effective, leaving many to wonder why he had not been chosen earlier in the tournament. Even so, Afghanistan's batsmen were collectively poor.
Entering into this tournament, Moles and the captain Mohammad Nabi had overseen the injection of a more youthful group of batsmen to the team, figuring that the likes of Afsar Zazai and Ahmadi would fare better in Australia and New Zealand than the likes of Karim Sadiq, a combustible but inconsistent opening batsman.
This decision was an investment in Afghanistan's cricketing future, and the youth of the batsmen in the squad is a major reason for the somewhat underwhelming displays they have put on. The most frustrating element of it all has been that the splendid Hamid Hassan has seldom had enough runs to bowl at: even in Sydney he was hurrying Ian Bell and Alex Hales, looking nothing quite so much as Ryan Harris with a headband.
Defending only an even 100 after rain calculations, Afghanistan did have the chance to unsettle what had to be a jittery England viewing area as they contemplated their measly target. Hassan's offsider Shapoor Zadran bowled usefully early on, and twice coaxed Hales into drives at the line of the ball that did not make adequate adjustments for its length or bounce.
Outside edges skewed from Hales' bat to backward point, where Najib Zadran got two hands to each chance but spilt them both. Najib's hands were hard each time, the ball bounding away as though it had struck a block of concrete. The misses came to exemplify a night where Afghanistan's fielders fumbled the ball over the boundary more than once - by the time Hassan dismissed Hales, only a further 18 runs were required.
Hassan's pace and quality have not flagged across this event, and it would be a an enormous shame were he not to be seen on the World Cup stage again. Afghanistan have treated this tournament as not only a shop window for their team to the world but also an investment in the future. Their younger squad members will be better for this experience, and more likely to last the distance next time around.
But of course the whole question of "next time" is wide open. Afghanistan have not quite confounded the view of that ICC official, their defeat at the SCG rounding off a tournament that has concluded in a more mediocre manner than Moles or Nabi had hoped for. They must now wait to see what form their pathway to 2019 will take, whether it is a narrow road or a wider highway.
If there was any consolation to be taken from the evening, it was that victory for England represented less than the minimum expected of arguably the cricket world's best-resourced and most amply staffed high-performance system. Afghanistan, with nothing like the same backing, had won only one fewer match. Even amid the gloom of the SCG, this stood as an achievement worth remembering.