Is there any good reason the Asia Cup is still with us?
Organisers will point to thousands upon thousands of reasons inside Dhaka's Mirpur stadium for every match of the 11th Asia Cup, and many more around the televisions of the subcontinent otherwise. And someone somewhere will be making enough money from this to think it a good idea.
For the insatiable fan – the tragics – there is probably just about enough around each of the four teams to stay interested. Pakistan have a new coach as well as an old debate about the captain.
Sachin Tendulkar is still searching for his hundredth hundred for India and if it happens, conceivably it could justify the existence of the entire tournament.
Watching Mahela Jayawardene lead a side, any side, is compelling enough in itself and the astounding, swift transformation he has affected upon Sri Lanka since taking over from Tillakaratne Dilshan is worth keeping an eye on.
Bangladesh, sadly and gloriously, are still at a stage where any and every international match holds a certain value of novelty.
But none of these need an Asia Cup specifically to provide context. All this would be as relevant - or not - in any bilateral series, or a triangular somewhere at any given time.
This particular edition actually feels more needless than previous ones, tacked on untidily to the end of a hectic winter itinerary.
The hosts' party has already come and gone with the Bangladesh Premier League; Pakistan have had a rare busy stretch of months. Sri Lanka have rested only on the flight back from Australia and await more intriguing contests against England.
And India? Well, they play a game only on those days the sun rises.
But the question about the Asia Cup is actually an ideological one: why is the Asia Cup?
In the mid-70s, when the idea first appeared, borne from an official alliance of Asian teams, there was understandable sense behind it.
Australia and England had long run cricket and India and Pakistan, swiftly emerging, wanted to change this. Tellingly for what was to come though, it wasn't until 1983 that they could get it together enough to form an Asian Cricket Council, and 1984 when the first tournament was held in Sharjah.
But now? What is the purpose of a continental body in a sport played by so few countries? The Asian bloc is no more.
Now it is simply the India bloc; of the others, one board can't pay its players, another can't play at home and the last is still battling for relevance. Within there is no unity, just unequal, dysfunctional relationships; India and Pakistan are in the middle of another tiff, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh do essentially what the Indian board tells them, Bangladesh are dangling Pakistan around with the flimsy promises of a visit and Pakistan's negligence was nearly fatal for Sri Lanka in Lahore three years ago. This group is in need of a therapist not a tournament.
There has always been something irregular and shapeless about the tournament (even if the last three editions have been held with some regularity).
Both Pakistan and India have once withdrawn. The tournament's been cancelled sometimes, simply forgotten at others.
Often it's been inclusive and nurturing, as when involving Hong Kong and the UAE and yet now, when there exists a true case for Afghanistan's participation, they've closed doors again. Astonishingly, it's only been played once in the country - Pakistan - which has done most to bring about its very existence.
Even during the mid-90s, amid cricket's power shift when the idea of Asian dominance was at its most imposing and cohesive, this tournament, held and organised on whims, failed to develop an identity. That is a particularly fatal flaw and in every sense whatever legacy it has carries the indelible stamp of cricket's worst-run administrations.
It is simply an ODI tournament that happens to involve Asian countries and happens only when administrators can be bothered to make it happen. The only reason it will register will be for the India-Pakistan encounter on Sunday, the first since the Mohali semi-final nearly a year ago.
Even then the crowning irony is that had it not been for this tournament, this month (as per the Future Tours Programme) may have seen an inestimably more fulfilling first full series between the two sides since late 2007.
That contest, any day, is a far greater demonstration of Asian strength.
