The much maligned Champions Trophy is finally set to take off with all its teams intact. The emerald isle of Sri Lanka is to play host to the crème de la crème after all. After all the drama off the field, the excitement finally moves onto the field of play, the highly audible collective sigh of relief amongst cricket administrators and players ready to be replaced by the incessant drum beats that are so typical of cricket following in and around Colombo.

For New Zealand, the defending champions, this will be an altogether new role. They have never defended a title before and it wouldn’t come as much of a surprise if they claimed that what they won at Nairobi in 2000 - their first significant triumph - was the ICC Knockout and that the Champions Trophy was a brand new tournament, with its first edition to be launched on Thursday, September 12, 2002. Anything to avoid the pressure of expectations.

Does the tournament have a favourite then? A very difficult question to answer. At least four teams - Australia, India, England and South Africa - are in very good form with hosts Lanka and the Kiwis themselves not too far back. And one can never rule out the Pakistanis for you never know what they will come up with and when. Just ask the Indian hockey team who were leading 3-1 in the Champions Trophy third place match against Pakistan with ten minutes to go only to find themselves 3-4 down when the final hooter went off.

That leaves us with Zimbabwe, Kenya, Bangladesh and Holland, all of whom it can safely be said have little or no chance of winning anything let alone the title. The Bangladesh coach - a Pakistani - has gone on record saying that his team has as much chance as any other team. In reality though, the coach’s home country has more chances of reverting to a democratic system than Bangladesh has of winning anything in Sri Lanka.

That brings us back to Australia. Twice they have traveled long distances to play in what is popularly referred to as the ‘Mini World Cup’ and both times have spent very little time on ground before emplaning for the journey back home. Both in Dhaka and at Nairobi, the Aussies received a hiding from the Indians, and yet, such has been their domination in recent times, that if there is to be a favourite for this edition, it must be the world champions, especially as the new league-cum-knockout format gives them a minimum of two matches, neither of which will be against India.

India, the runners-up at Nairobi, will start second favourite. Their showing in England has earned them that status and the fact that the England attack possessed neither a Glenn McGrath or a Shuan Pollock cannot take too much away from the performance. The depth that the Indians displayed in the tri-nation series which also included Sri Lanka was heartening. Their youngsters showed that they could be counted on to win matches on their own while also contributing much needed athleticism on the field.

It is the Indian bowling which is suspect. But in typical Lankan conditions, the bowlers don’t count for much anyway. Also, India’s many part-time spinners like Virender Sehwag, Yuveraj Singh and Dinesh Mongia may just get to play their part with the ball.

Where does that leave South Africa, the winners of the inaugural event in Bangladesh. Somewhere in between, perhaps. They had a bad tournament in Morocco where their batting let them down badly. They haven’t had too much time to recover but skipper Pollock is a confident man and claims that they have put that disaster behind them.

Their bigger worry though is the way they were dominated by Australia when they hosted them last. Comprehensively beaten in both versions, the shocked Proteas axed their coach and changed the selection committee in an effort to regain some ground. How far they have succeeded, if at all, remains to be seen.

For the hosts, it all boils down to the availability of their skipper Sanath Jayasuriya, who is fast recovering from an injury sustained in the Morocco Cup final. Jayasuriya hopes to be fit for the opener against Pakistan on Thursday and it is a hope that is sure to be shared by the entire island nation.

Over to the cricket then.