When a chastened England left Dubai in October 2024, who would have thought they would be spending the eve of their home T20 World Cup final at Lord's preparing to face Australia?
From a nerve-addled unit who couldn't hold their catches against West Indies and were knocked out in the group stage as a result, to a confident team, undefeated through the tournament and with one hand hovering over the trophy, the hosts have reinvented themselves.
"A lot of cricket has happened between 2024 and now," Nat Sciver-Brunt, the England captain, told reporters at Lord's ahead of the final.
"Initially there was a lot of disbelief that we'd lost one game and didn't quite make it into the semis, so I suppose that game was chaotic for all sorts of reasons. But where we are now is, I think, a much more composed and confident team. We have been put under pressure and we've been able to come out the other side."
While final proof lies in whether they win on Sunday, that is harsh in the context of how far England have come in 21 months. That the proof will come against Australia is poignant.
Victory over not just the old enemy, but the side which sparked such change in England after their winless Ashes tour of Australia in 2025, would mean a huge amount to Charlotte Edwards, the head coach appointed in the aftermath of that debacle, and to Sciver-Brunt, who took over from Heather Knight as skipper.
"Our team has come quite a long way since that Ashes tour," Sciver-Brunt said. "Everyone knows what it's about, we're playing in a World Cup final at home at Lord's. The occasion is already massive and we're playing Australia.
"There's not really been any talk about the Ashes or proving people wrong from that. We've done a lot of hard work since that tour to show where we are as a group."
Sciver-Brunt, Knight and Danni Wyatt-Hodge are the only players remaining from the successful campaign of 2017 when England won the 50-over World Cup on home soil. And while Sciver-Brunt said there would be some reflection on 2017, she acknowledged that this team would do things their own way.
"Everything that we've worked on was to try and get us to this point," Sciver-Brunt said. "Being part of the 2017 final, we spoke in a similar way about how special a day it was going to be, trying to be really present during the day. That is what I've been trying to instil in everybody."
So good have the hosts been at living in the moment, that Sciver-Brunt said her wife and former England seamer, Katherine, who was part of the 2017 title-winning side, had to remind her of the enormity of what this side had achieved when they defeated South Africa in the semi-final.
"Katherine said to me after the game the other night, 'it's actually bigger than you think it is,' so I guess we've been living in our bubble as a team together and not letting anyone stray out of that," she said.
"Once we finish the tournament and they reflect over the next few weeks, we can hopefully see how much and how far and what it's meant to people watching it in the country."
Opposite number Sophie Molineux, another new captain following her appointment as the retired Alyssa Healy's successor in January, has taken a similar path in rebuilding a side, albeit not from the depths England have experienced. And, like England, Australia have progressed through this tournament undefeated.
England have lost all six World Cup finals they have contested with Australia across formats and their semi-final victory on the way to winning the T20 title at home in 2009 remains the only time they have beaten Australia in either knockout phase.
And while Australia are seeking a seventh T20 World Cup crown, their elimination in the semi-finals of the T20 World Cup in 2024 and, more recently the 50-over tournament, where they were knocked out by eventual champions India, has left them with no title to defend.
"The learnings and the lessons we got out of that game, we've held really close to us for that six or seven months since," Molineux said. "The way that the group has been able to grow over the last three or four months especially, almost releasing the shackles a little bit and allowing ourselves to play freely, use our class, use our skill. It's a very smart cricket team, they know what they're doing.
"You can't really sit back and wait for the game to come to you in T20 cricket and that's a big thing for us, to be able to express ourselves and play our way, whether that be to take on the opposition in a really aggressive way or is it to absorb and use our cricket smarts.
"That's the beauty of our team. We're able to read a game situation and we're going to be thrown a different challenge and a different situation tomorrow, but our ability to read that and be able to stay calm and make the right decisions for the team, we've done really well."
Australia completely outclassed England across formats during the Ashes but, like their opponents, they were giving short shrift to talk of revenge or psychological advantage.
"They were playing a different style of cricket and we're probably playing a different style of cricket too," Molineux said. "We've definitely looked at all the data and numbers and everything behind it and made plans from that. Tomorrow's going to be a new challenge and we're very much looking forward to it.
"I grew up watching Test cricket with my dad and I reckon about 15 years ago I said to him, 'I want to watch a game of Test cricket here at Lord's.' Who would have thought that tomorrow we'd be running out and playing a World Cup final here in front of a packed crowd?"
With two captains and their teams, living out "who would have thought…?' moments who dares to guess how we might choose between them?