Howzat?! Have Americans finally been bowled over?

The T20 World Cup shows the US's love affair with cricket has been far from smooth, as Cameron Ponsonby explains

- Cameron Ponsonby

So, has the T20 World Cup in America worked? In Dallas? Yes. In New York? Maybe. And in Florida? Well, it's raining.

Despite the bells and whistles that surrounded cricket being played in the Big Apple, Dallas is actually the home of cricket in the United States - and it showed, all four fixtures played at the Grand Prairie Stadium being wonderful events with fantastic atmospheres.

The opening night between the USA and Canada was a remarkable evening, with New York-born Aaron Jones playing the innings of a lifetime to give America a fantastic victory in front of a raucous crowd.

It was the start that the competition, and American cricket, needed. In the week leading up to the tournament, fears over ticket sales and the weather had rumbled on. Such was the concern about empty stands that, four days before the opening fixture, USA Cricket announced an “exclusive ticketing opportunity” where members could buy up to six tickets at 25 per cent off, having previously claimed the match was a sellout. Clearly, this had not been the case.

But while the fears were hypothetical, the success of the evening was tangible and set the tone for the games that have followed.

Thanks to the large Nepalese diaspora in Dallas, Nepal’s fixture against the Netherlands produced arguably the best atmosphere of the tournament, as the 5,500-strong Nepalese crowd sang and danced their way through the match, even if it ended in a sixwicket defeat for their countrymen.

Nepal’s following has become a storyline of the tournament. The fastest-growing Asian population in the United States, Nepalese-Americans have been travelling from far and wide to support their country in their first World Cup since 2014.