Let's Pray England's Staging of the World Twenty20 Isn't Too Embarrassing

All of a sudden it feels as though there might just, perhaps, be a big cricket tournament heading our way. Emerging from the mist of assorted footballing excitements and a funereal West Indies tour, the first traces of the World Twenty20 – which kicks off at Lord's on Friday – are coming into view. South Africa have already rejected the net facilities at Southgate. Pakistan have arrived with a brand new 17-year-old fast-bowling sensation (the left-armer Mohammad Aamer). Andrew Flintoff is injured. This is not a drill. It's actually going to happen. And once again it's hard to shake the old stomach-churning anxieties that surface whenever English cricket addresses the apparently baffling logistical challenge of staging a global tournament. Please, you think to yourself, please just let it not be too embarrassing this time.

English cricket has form here. There just seems to be something about the act of throwing its curtains wide to the world that brings about the most terrible wobbles. The World Twenty20 will duly launch in the shadow of past disappointments. Most notably the 1999 World Cup, the opening ceremony for which has already passed into legend. Mainly this is for the distressingly violent military fly-by that wreathed Lord's in smoke and a rousing speech from Tony Blair that was only marginally improved by his microphone being turned on halfway through.

It was a bumpy ride all the way. Official ECB-mandated steel bands played through the drizzle at Leeds, the Trent Bridge PA threatened Indian spectators with ejection unless they reduced the levels of "excessive noise", an inexplicable soft drinks can ban was enforced, and England's official World Cup anthem – All over the World, performed by the man from the Eurythmics – was released only after the team had been eliminated from its own tournament at the earliest possible stage.

English cricket could only smudge so much gloss from the assembled talent (this was the World Cup of Shoaib Akhtar, Lance Klusener and Shane Warne) but the final was a disaster, Pakistan wilting utterly under leaden English skies, as Lord's PR wonks were reduced to handing around press releases trumpeting the sheer volume of high-fliers in attendance (for the record: "A glittering array of celebrities are here. TV presenter Chris Evans is having his unique brand of showbusiness brio while supermodel Caprice supplies the catwalk glamour to Lord's. Also here is the Wimbledon footballer Robbie Earle, the FA acting chief executive David Davies, BBC commentator John Motson, plus Nicholas Parsons, ex-Neighbours soap star Mark Little and Clive Mantle from Casualty"). Yes, Joe Mangle. Really.

Things went a little better at the Champions Trophy in 2004. The real sticking point here was the self-destructive scheduling, with the ICC's silver-standard tournament taking place amid the mists and mellow fruitfulness of September – not to mention the yowling back-page overload of the start of the football season. One Indian journalist was dispatched to provide a daily round-up of English cricket headlines, but simply gave up: there were no headlines. Even England's victory over Australia in the semis made little impression, and the West Indies duly beat the hosts in a thrilling but largely overlooked final amid the gathering winter chill.

This time around English cricket has something extra to contend with: Twenty20, its own terrifying, overgrown, Ritalin-fuelled offspring. The ECB's attempts to come to terms with the new format have so far borne comparison with a gathering of senior Conservative politicians attempting to break dance. This time around, though, they have at least come up with a plan and followed the current county formula of getting a South African in. The tournament has been fine-tuned by Steve Elworthy, organiser of the successful first World Twenty20 in South Africa in 2007. Elworthy only came on board in January, but has already promised, rather worryingly, to "capture the imagination of the world". This will be done by following the new-format gimmickry, "the dug-outs and DJ boxes and dance podiums", although he has stopped short of introducing "dunk tanks", a kind of lager-flavored paddling pool in which rotund, leering men can safely sunburn themselves.

Still the opening ceremony is cloaked in rather limp and easily punctured secrecy. Who will be headlining? Elton John? Eminem? Susan Boyle singing Dreadlock Holiday on top of a double decker bus while Boris Johnson dances like Gravy wearing a wedding dress and full kit? In fact, it's Alesha Dixon, the one who used to be in a band, then went on TV doing dancing and who seems nice enough. It is at least a significant date on Alesha's official website, which lists her June schedule as "05 Lords Cricket Ground Gig. 06 Royal Holloway Uni Gig".

Can an Elworthy/Dixon dream-team really banish the hand-wringing, blazered ghosts of tournaments past? Often it comes down to the little things. Good weather will help. An opening ceremony that rises above primary school fete standard would be nice. But really it's about the crowds. One of the big drivers behind South Africa's success was the emphasis on "rock bottom pricing": £1.50 for the opening rounds and £4-5 for a decent seat in the Super Sixes. The grounds were packed: 10,000 watched Bangladesh v Pakistan in Cape Town. Predictably the English interpretation of rock-bottom pricing is chillingly Alpine: £60 for a good seat a group game, £15 for kids and a cool £90 to watch the final. As of this morning tickets for Friday's opener against Holland were still available.

But still we have hope. Hope that the weather, at least, might stay set fair for Friday's firework-laden Lord's spectacular, and that maybe, just maybe, this time we might escape without something really embarrassing happening.