The jubilation that surrounded Bermuda?s qualification yesterday for the cricket World Cup in 2007 in the West Indies should not obscure the fact that this is the end of the beginning, and not an end in itself. That?s because Bermuda now faces the much harder task of performing respectably against the best cricketers in the world.

That reality should not take away from the team?s success. But the teamwork and unity that they showed in reeling off three straight victories at the ICC Trophy in Ireland will become even more important now. Much of the credit for the team?s success has been attributed to national coach Gus Logie?s quiet and determined approach. This Bermuda team showed a level of discipline and commitment that has often been lacking in the past and the players say that the former West Indies Test star and coach is responsible for that.

So the Bermuda Cricket Board?s first job must be to ensure that Mr. Logie remains at the helm of the team for at least the next two years.

Its next job is to ensure that the national team and Bermuda cricket in general has the financial strength to prepare for the job. The fact that qualification for the World Cup means Bermuda cricket will receive $500,000 from the International Cricket Conference is a welcome windfall. Rightly, some of that money is earmarked not for the national team but for development in general. That?s vital because Bermuda must see qualification for the World Cup as a new chapter in the Island?s long cricketing history. If Bermuda is to be more than a one-day wonder, the development of young cricketers has to continue and to be expanded.

The BCB has already taken some steps in this direction by sending players to various cricket academies around the world and with helping promising young fast bowler Stefan Kelly to go to school in England. But more needs to be done to keep the best and brightest of Bermuda?s young cricketers on track for the world stage.

But the BCB needs to ensure that it has enough money to keep the national squad together for the next couple of years with regular matches against first class and Test nation opposition. The automatic granting of one day status to Bermuda will help in this regard, but the finances must be there to make it happen. The ideal would be to have enough money in hand to make the Bermuda squad at least semi-professional. This means asking the players to give up their careers as Policemen, teachers, telephone technicians and the like in order to dedicate enormous amounts of time to cricket, so ensuring they are compensated adequately is vital and the money given by the ICC ? as generous as it is ? will not be enough.

Sports Minister Dale Butler has said Government will do its best to provide funding (and that again begs the question of why $1 million has been dedicated to the Twenty20 tournament here next year for a bunch of retired Test players), but it is also important that the private sector step forward. That can and should only happen if the BCB can show that it has its own house in order. The Board has taken huge strides in that direction since former president El James took over the reins. But the Board, under current president Reginald Pearman and chief executive Neil Speight, still has work to do.

Why is this World Cup so important? On the very highest level, the team has the capacity to pull the Bermuda community together in a way that has never have happened before. Only in cricket will a team from Bermuda have the opportunity to play before an audience of tens of millions. Football may be Bermuda?s most popular sport and people like Shaun Goater and Khano Smith are wonderful ambassadors, but the Island?s chances of ever qualifying for World Cup are slim to none

Premier Alex Scott said this week that the cricket team has the chance to be world-beaters. He?s right, but the World Cup also provides the opportunity to be world laughingstocks, and at worst, Bermuda needs to be sufficiently prepared to avoid humiliation at the hands of a team like Australia.

A BBC Online story yesterday nicely illustrated the challenge when it noted that the population of Bermuda would barely fill half of the Eden Gardens stadium in Calcutta, India. That is the challenge that a small place like Bermuda faces. It will be going up against countries that have hundreds of thousands of people playing cricket on a regular basis where Bermuda, at best, can say that hundreds do. All should praise the Bermuda cricket team on this momentous achievement, but no one should forget that the work is only just beginning.