Sachin Tendulkar helps bring some joy back to India

But spectators came en masse on the last two days and they saw sport of the kind that reaffirms life, or at least helps one to forget reality.

After the Mumbai attacks, the match had a context which sport does not normally have. In response, England's players donated half their match fees to the victims' families, and the Indian board donated too, but the players of both countries gave something far more precious: for they replaced horrifying images with happy ones.

Several players raised their game to such an extent that the man of the match award should have been shared four ways. Andrew Strauss deserved a share for scoring a century in each innings, the first England batsman to do so in Asia. He had strength, under mental if not physical fire, to the point of serenity.

Bowlers are usually overlooked for the awards, but Zaheer Khan deserved a share: India's left-arm pace bowler is at the top of his game. On a pitch which helped spinners, Zaheer brought England's second innings to a standstill with his reverse swing, so that India had to chase less than 400.

Even so, 387 had never been chased successfully in a Test in Asia: around the world, in pushing 2,000 Test matches, a target of such size had only been achieved three times. Virender Sehwag set off like a Japanese train. He is today's match-winner, the mental dominator - or disintegrator.

Then, Sachin Tendulkar had to programme his cricket brain precisely to finish the game – and he did. Tendulkar heeded every cue, worked out the percentage strokes, and executed his game plan to as near perfection as any human being could. A couple of parents from his daughter's school had been killed; and he dedicated this masterpiece of a century – so soon afterwards – to all Indians.