Targetting the rings

Cricket : The ICC and IOC explore ways to bring the game into the Olympic fold after more than a century

It has been 115 years since Devon and Somerset Wanderers, representing Britain, and the French Athletic Club Union, representing France, played a cricket match at the Paris Summer Olympics.

That match in 1900 remains cricket’s only involvement in the Games, but the sport could soon return to the Olympics. In mid-November, the International Cricket Council (ICC) will meet with the International Olympic Committee (IOC) in Lausanne, Switzerland, to discuss cricket’s possible inclusion in the 2024 Games.

Cricket’s appearing in the Games would fit into a recent trend in which the world’s most popular sports join the Olympics. Both golf and rugby, in the form of sevens, will return to next year’s Olympics; golf has not featured since 1904, and rugby not since 1924.

“If you’re an Olympic sport it opens the doors into ministries of education, and rugby can be on the curriculum,” Morgan Buckley, general manager of development for World Rugby, explained recently. “When rugby is shown on every TV screen next year, people will really see rugby in a new light.”

Many in cricket believe that the sport could benefit similarly from Olympic inclusion. The MCC World Cricket Committee, an independent research institution made up of cricketing luminaries, advocates cricket’s inclusion, and 90 percent of the ICC's members supported the notion of including cricket in the Olympics during a survey in 2008.

If cricket is to expand its global footprint there is compelling logic in an Olympic bid. Olympic inclusion would be crucial for cricket in emerging nations — including China. Since rugby became an Olympic sport, over $15 million a year from Chinese national and local government has been invested in rugby sevens; a similar amount would be invested in cricket if it is added to the Games, said Terry Zhang, secretary general of the Chinese Cricket Association. “There is a huge difference between Olympics sports and non-Olympics sports in China. The media are also far more interested in Olympic sports.”

Other emerging nations would also receive a significant increase in government funding, were cricket in the Games. “If cricket was in the Olympics a large number of these countries would get IOC and government grants. In addition, sponsors would be more willing to back them,” said Ehsan Mani, a former ICC president.

Women’s cricket would also benefit. “Anything that gives a global platform to the sport is good. For women’s cricket it might be especially beneficial,” said Angus Porter, chief executive of the Professional Cricketers’ Association in England.

Inclusion in the Games would also lead to the IOC's opening up direct funding for cricket. A report presented to the ICC executive board two years ago said that Olympic status would result in funding from the IOC of $15 million to $20 million every Olympic Games and a separate “conservative projection” of Olympic Solidarity Commission funding totaling $4 million to $6 million per year.

It is clear, too, that the IOC is eager to explore cricket’s inclusion in the Olympics. The main  reason is financial: The IOC sees including cricket in the Games as a way in to the subcontinent, and the 1.6 billion people who live in Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, India and Pakistan. “If you said to broadcasters in India, we’re going to put cricket in, suddenly you’ve got them very interested,” said Andrew Wildblood, a senior vice president of IMG, an international sports marketing firm.

Historically cricket has been reluctant to join the Olympic Games, in large part because of England’s fear about the disruption that the Olympics would cause to the English cricket season. But England’s stance has recently changed, with Colin Graves, the new chairman of the England Cricket Board, declaring: “Cricket should be an Olympic sport.”

While it is now plausible that cricket will return to the Games in 2024, significant obstacles remain. The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) does not fully comply with the World Anti-Doping Agency, which is a precondition for sports joining the Games. The board is also concerned about losing image rights over Indian cricketers for the duration of the Games, as well as losing autonomy as a national sports governing body.
“Not being part of the Olympic movement as far as the BCCI is concerned is a matter of avoiding accountability and transparency in its dealings,” Mani, the former ICC president, said.

For cricket to join the Olympics, the IOC and ICC would also have to agree to a format. While the Twenty20 format would seem well suited to the Games, the ICC is also considering proposing six-a-side, or even indoor cricket. The IOC is unlikely to look favorably on such proposals and would need to be convinced that international teams would send strong teams to maximise interest from the Asian subcontinent. Because there is already a World T20 competition held every four years, the ICC might fear a similar competition in the Games would damage the value of its own event.

Venues might prove another complication, although artificial cricket wicket areas and temporary stands could provide a solution, as they have historically done for baseball.

The competing nations in the Olympic Games would be different from those in international cricket. England, Scotland and Northern Ireland (which forms part of the all-Ireland cricket team) would compete as part of a Britain team; the West Indies would participate as individual nations. Nevertheless, all of the cricket boards affected support cricket’s inclusion in the Games.

The outcome of the meetings between the ICC and the IOC loom as critical, both to cricket’s chances of expanding into new frontiers and to developing women’s cricket and the Olympic Games’ prospects of increasing its appeal to India. “The IOC has a good relationship and an ongoing dialogue with the ICC,” says Emmanuelle Moreau, a spokeswoman for the IOC, who called the coming meeting with the ICC. “an opportunity to learn more about the future development of cricket.”

Paris is one of the favorites to host the 2024 Summer Games. And while France is no cricket stronghold, returning to the city that hosted the only previous cricket match in the Games might prove to be a romantic return for cricket to the Olympics.