Cricket’s future gleamed from the contents of the India-New Zealand match at Wellington’s Hnry Stadium: Abhishek Sharma and Vaibhav Sooryavanshi plundered 133 runs in just 7.1 overs; India chased down 199 with 40 balls and six wickets to spare to seal the five-match T20I series at the first opportunity; a batsman reached 50 in 15 balls and 100 in 35; a 15-year-old tore apart men twice his age; a free-spirited phenom made bowlers curse and question their existence.

The match was a vision of how the sport would be over the next decade, or the one after, where T20 might have delinked fully from its parent sport and stood as a singular, autonomous sport.

A script from fiction unfolded. The contest was effectively over after three searing overs as 64 runs were ransacked in 18 deliveries. Runs arrived in a blur of limbs and hits.

Sooryavanshi set the tone, thumping the first ball of the chase from Jacob Duffy over the mid-on fielder to the fence.…