India’s Embrace Of The Asian Games Underlines Cricket’s 2028 Olympic Ambitions

In 2010 cricket made its debut in the Asian Games – the world’s second biggest multi-sports event – but there was a major void.

India, the sport’s powerhouse, did not send its men’s or women’s teams in an undeniable huge blow to cricket’s credibility in the Asian Games and confirmed the all-powerful governing body’s reluctance to compete at multi-sports events.

Cricket, often bandied around as the world’s second most popular sport, had not been part of multi-sports events since the 1998 Commonwealth Games and famously appeared in just one Olympics – the 1900 Games featuring only two teams.

There had been an appetite from many in the cricket community and within the International Olympic Committee to propel the bat and ball sport – massively popular in South Asia, a vast populace not particularly enamoured with the world’s biggest sports event – back into the Olympics.

According to sources, informal discussions between the IOC and senior cricket administrators had been held during the 2008 Beijing Games. The Indian Premier League had launched earlier that year, fuelling the rise of the three-hour T20 format that would ultimately transform cricket.

It was a shorter, exciting form of cricket that appeared suitable for the Olympics. There appeared a perfect match. With far more eyeballs from the lucrative South Asian audience, the IOC had an avenue to significantly increase its broadcast value while cricket – invisible to large chunks of the world – sought widespread exposure beyond its traditional base.

But India feared losing its autonomy to the country’s Olympic committee and – along with fellow powers England with the Olympics held during the cricket season in the U.K. – believed the Olympics impeded with lucrative bilateral series.

Cricket’s Olympic dreams appeared to be fading but the sport did appear at the 2014 Asian Games in Incheon, South Korea. India, however, again did not field teams and there was little surprise that cricket was axed for the next event four years later in Jakarta.

But those long-held reservations have simmered with India – along with England – now on board cricket’s determined push for inclusion into the Los Angeles Olympics.

Jay Shah, India’s cricket chief, was added to the ICC’s Olympic working committee shortly after last year’s chair election underlining India’s change of tune. The original committee was set up in late 2020 by veteran Associates board director Imran Khwaja, but has undergone numerous tweaks since.

Cricket’s fate should be determined in the coming months, but reports in The Guardian and Washington Post have indicated the growing likelihood of it being included.

Sources close to those working on the Olympic bid in recent years have expressed growing optimism, though there has been a feeling that the Los Angeles organizing committee have been less enthusiastic about cricket than its IOC counterparts.

Ahead of the long-awaited decision, cricket will return to the Asian Games at the upcoming event in Hangzhou, China, with India to field men’s and women’s teams. Amid a hectic schedule comprising the Asia Cup and the World Cup, India will send a second-sting men’s team for their Asian Games debut.

Once a park adorned with sunflower plants, cricket will be played at the Zhejiang University of Technology Pingfeng field. There will be 15 men’s teams and nine women’s teams competing from September 19-October 7.

The event is not only hoped to provide a much-needed tonic for Chinese cricket, which was once a target market of the ICC, but to also showcase all-important India’s embrace of multi-sports events.

“We are particularly pleased to acknowledge BCCI (Board of Control for Cricket in India) for their participation in a multi-sport event of this nature for the first time,” ACC chairman of development committee Mahinda Vallipuram told me.

“This landmark occasion witnesses all five Asian full member cricket nations participating under the banner of the Olympic Council of Asia. We are optimistic that this participation serves as a stepping stone towards cricket’s inclusion in future Olympics and regional events.

“Importantly, this marks the first instance where a substantial number of National Olympic Councils across Asia have designated cricket as a constituent part of their teams for the Asian Games.”