Cricket World Cup History: 3 times the host nation won the tournament

Home advantage is crucial in every sport. The fans of the home team come out in large numbers to support their local heroes and act as an extra man in favour of their team.

In cricket, this advantage extends beyond just the support. Every country is different in its conditions. The temperature, wind speed, humidity, nature of the pitch, size of the ground -- everything plays a major part in the game of cricket. For example, the ball will get more spin on the dusty pitches of the Indian sub-continent thus helping the spinners. It will get much more bounce on the bouncy pitches of Australia and South Africa thus helping the pacers. And if we look at the pitches of England and New Zealand, the ball will swing away from the batsman more than anywhere else in the world.

And maybe this is the reason that most of the time, we see the host nations performing relatively better than their counterparts in bilateral series and in the ICC tournaments as well. As far as the ODI World Cup is concerned, out of the total 11 editions till date, 3 have been won by one of the host nations. So let us have a look at all these instances.

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#3 1996 - Sri Lanka

Sri Lanka Win the 1996 ICC Cricket World Cup Final v Australia

The 1996 Cricket World Cup was jointly hosted by India, Pakistan and Sri Lanka. It was the second time that the competition was held in India and Pakistan but Sri Lanka was made the host nation for the very first time. They grabbed this opportunity with both hands as they defeated Australia by 7 wickets in the final played at Lahore and won their first and only World Cup till date.

Sri Lanka also gained two unsporting advantages in the group stage of the tournament. The Australian and West Indies teams refused to travel to Colombo for their match against Sri Lanka amidst security concerns. Therefore the Sri Lankans were declared the winners of these fixtures by walkover.

Sri Lanka faced India in the semifinals, held at the Eden Gardens. The Sri Lankans were awarded a victory before the match was even completed as the Indian crowd at the Eden started riots due to the poor performance of the Indian team. Team India was 120/8 while chasing a target of 252.

The leading run scorer of the tournament was Sachin Tendulkar who scored 523 runs and the leading wicket-taker was Anil Kumble who took 15 wickets.

#2 2011 - India

India v Sri Lanka - 2011 ICC World Cup Final

The year 2011 holds a special place in every Indian's heart. That six by Mahendra Singh Dhoni in the final against Sri Lanka will be remembered for a long, long time.

The 2011 World Cup was planned to be jointly hosted by India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, and Bangladesh. But following the attack on the Sri Lankan team in 2009 in Lahore, Pakistan was revoked of their host nation status and the competition was then jointly organized by India, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh.

The two host nations, India and Sri Lanka reached the final of the tournament thus making it the first all-Asian final.

The final was played on 2nd April 2011 in the Wankhede Stadium, Mumbai. The Sri Lankan captain Kumar Sangakkara won the toss and decided to bat first. Jayawardene scored a brilliant century and helped Sri Lanka score a total of 274 runs for the loss of 6 wickets after 50 overs. It was India's chance to chase!

The Indian innings started poorly as they lost the wicket of Virender Sehwag on the second ball of the innings. 'The God of Cricket' Sachin Tendulkar came in to bat at No. 3 but it was not his day either as he got out after scoring just 18 runs. The next batsman was the young Virat Kohli and it was Gautam Gambir on the other end. Both of them started the recovery process for India. They managed to get a much-needed 83-run partnership and took India to a total of 114 runs after which Sri Lankans got the wicket of Kohli.

MS Dhoni came into bat at No. 5 and made an impressive partnership of 109 runs with Gautam Gambhir before Gambir got out on 97. The next batsman was Yuvraj Singh, and with 52 required off 52 deliveries, India was in a position where they could not have afforded any more wicket. MS Dhoni continued his brilliance with Yuvi giving him the much-needed support and won the final for India. MSD scored a total of 91 runs not out on just 79 balls and was awarded the Man of the Match.

It was the second time in history and after a gap of 28 long years that India finally got their hands on the World Cup.

Yuvraj Singh was awarded the Man of the Tournament award for his brilliant performances, both with the ball and the bat consistently throughout the tournament.

Tillakaratne Dilshan was the highest run scorer with 500 runs. Shahid Afridi and Zaheer Khan were the joint highest wicket-takers with 21 wickets for each.

#3 2015 - Australia

Australia v New Zealand - 2015 ICC Cricket World Cup: Final

The 2015 ICC Cricket World Cup was jointly hosted by Australia and New Zealand. It was the second time that the World Cup was hosted by these two neighbouring countries.

Both the host nations performed brilliantly as both of them reached the final of the tournament.

The final was played at the Melbourne Cricket Ground in front of a record-breaking crowd of more than 93 thousand. It was the first time that the New Zealand team reached the final but the story was completely different for their counterparts as it was the seventh final for the Aussies.

Team New Zealand won the toss and decided to bat first but just managed to score a mere total of 183 runs before getting all out against the strong Australian bowling attack. The Aussies chased this total with ease and comfortably won the match by 7 wickets to get their hands on the World Cup for a record 5th time.

Martin Guptill was the highest run scorer with 547 runs which included a brilliant double century against the West Indies in the quarterfinals. Mitchell Starc and Trent Boult were the joint highest wicket-takers with 22 wickets each.