Sri Lanka to support cricket’s inclusion in the Olympics

By Sa’adi Thawfeeq

Sri Lanka Cricket President Shammi Silva

Sri Lanka will support the ICC to include cricket in the Olympics, Sri Lanka Cricket President Shammi Silva said.

The ICC is continuing with its push for a return of cricket to the Olympics, having recently asked all its members to report on the potential financial benefits of inclusion.

“The ICC has to come back to us on how much it is going to cost them. After that only the ICC will take a decision. The ICC has to bear the cost. The ICC does not have a budget for the Olympics at the moment. They are working out with it,” said Silva.

“If we get into the Olympics definitely we are interested. They are trying to play a T10 tournament in the Olympics,” he said.

Cricket could make its entry at the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics.

Cricket has previously featured in the Olympic only once. In the 1900 Paris Olympics after Belgium and Netherlands withdrew, the only match in the tournament saw Great Britain defeat France by 158 runs to claim the Gold medal. France received the Silver medal.

Cricket was included once in the 1998 Commonwealth Games in Malaysia where matches were played over 50 overs but as most of the participating countries had sent under strength sides the matches were not granted full ODI status. 

For instance Sri Lanka who had won the World Cup in 1996 included only two of the players from the winning side in their 14-member team – Hashan Tillakaratne who captained the side to the Commonwealth Games and Upul Chandana. Sri Lanka failed to win the Bronze medal being beaten by 51 runs by New Zealand. South Africa went onto win the Gold and Australia the Silver. England did not participate.

Not all ICC-member countries are keen to have cricket included in the Olympics notably the ‘big three’ – India, England and Australia who stand the least to gain and most to lose from participation in the Olympics as they have indicated that the requisite window in the schedule would eat into their bilateral series plans and leave them out of pocket.