New Delhi, Feb. 22 -- The sun sets and twilight begins. You can see clearly still, but darkness is coming. It's called the Civil Dusk in meteorological terms, but in sport this time is more an uncivil, cranky struggle. The end is inevitable, but it's always fought. Think of it as a messy, magnificent attempt to try and reclaim the unreclaimable, to ward off the smirking creep of age and to search for the last remains of the great player they once knew.

Rohit Sharma, 37, is there, so is Virat Kohli, 36. These aren't slumps, these are slides of varying speeds. But if twilight only ends one way, we're uncertain how long it lasts. Lionel Messi, 37, is stretching his in a slower US league. LeBron James, 40, is still rising against all tides. ...