NOT a day has gone by in the first week of the eighth WorldCup without some new development to divert attention away from the cricket. - but the cricket has proved compelling enough to complement, if not counter, the unwanted side bars.
The farcical political wrangling over England's refusal to go to Zimbabwe that preceded the tournament has dragged on...and on...and on as the indulgent Inter-national Cricket Conference (ICC) has hemmed and hawed and made a fool of itself.
While that issue went from technical committee to special judge and back to technical committee, the Cup lost two of its most identifiable stars, for completely different reasons.
Shane Warne flew back to Australia before he could twirl a single leg-break past a bemused batsman, there to confront his latest crisis.
The drugs charge arising out of some substance he claims his mother innocently gave him could well end the career of one of the greatest bowlers, and most controversial characters the game has known.
The finger Jonty Rhodes broke two days later while making a routine save in his favourite point position has definitely brought the international curtain down on a fielder extraordinaire, another of the great entertainers and a role model for countless South Africans of all races.
Even as a crestfallen Rhodes was eliminated from a tournament he planned as his grand finale, another South African in a prominent position was attracting the headlines for the wrong reasons.
Percy Sonn, no less than the president of the United Cricket Board of South Africa (UCBSA) and a judge advocate to boot, was obliged to publicly apologise after confessing to newspaper reports that he was very drunk, very disorderly and very conspicuous during a match in Paarl.
To add to the spice all newspaper editors relish, two of Zimbabwe's most famous players, Andy Flower, who is white, and Henry Olonga, who is black, took the brave decision, uncommon in sportsmen, of issuing an uncompromising statement condemning the government of their benighted country.
To enforce their point, they wore black armbands in their match against Namibia in Harare. What their future, cricketing or otherwise, holds can only be guessed at.
Nasser Hussain determined his future on his own.
Caught in the middle of the whole sorry mess over Zimbabwe, the England captain unsurprisingly snapped under the pressure. He reportedly used especially expressive language to tell ICC chief executive Malcolm Speed what he thought of him and his organization and, refusing to apologise, announced he would quit the job at the end of the tournament.
With such distractions, it is a wonder anyone could concentrate on the cricket. But the players, the organisers, the thousands of cheery, helpful volunteers, in their distinctive purple hats and tunics, at every ground and crowds who have flocked to the matches are clearly intent on making this World Cup a success.
The Zimbabwe affair has become a bore and Warne has simply given South Africans a chance to gloat over the tribulations of a sportsman they love to hate.
Rhodes' misfortune has been the understandable cause of anguish while Sonn's indiscretions - "I'm a man who likes my liquor," he said - immediately added a new word to the cricketing lexicon. Now it's "let's get Sonned", rather than "stoned".
But these matters were all peripheral to the main event that has had as much as the public could ask for, - and more.
The pulsating opening match that yielded 545 runs, Brian Lara's hundred, a riffle of sixes and fours and a West Indies victory by three runs that, at one and the same time, thrilled and stunned South Africans, set the tone. It hasn't diminished since.
The fairytale upset by Canada's multi-national collection of weekend amateurs over Bangladesh, New Zealand's electric fielding that strangled the West Indies, Chaminda Vaas' incredible hat-trick from the first three balls of the match against Bangladesh and the hurricane speed of Shoaib Akhtar and Brett Lee on opposite sides in the same match have been only as few of the highlights of the opening week.
Nothing yet has been more awesome than the all-round strength of Australia.
They came as the 1999 champions and the favourites. Their clinical demolition of Pakistan, inspired by the exceptional hundred by Andrew Symonds, one of their lesser players, and of India prompted the comment from Hussain yesterday that what has been proved so far is that every team is beatable, except Australia.
It might be a strangely negative comment from a captain of a competing team and it is a proven truth that any team in any sport is beatable. But it would take something out of the ordinary for the Australians to watch someone else raise the Cup - and the US$2 million first prize - at Johannesburg's Wanderers Stadium March 23.
For all the others, another tense three weeks remain before they know the other five to advance to the last six, the Super Six round.