(Bombay) The IOC Executive Board validated on Friday the integration of cricket into the 2028 Olympic Games in Los Angeles, the main innovation of an Olympic program extended beyond 35 sports, a record in the history of the Games.
King sport in India, which is currently hosting its World Cup, cricket returns to the Olympic Games more than a century after its brief appearance during the Parisian edition of 1900, provided that the 141st session of the Olympic body definitively endorses Monday its inclusion.
For now, it is only one of five “additional sports” proposed on Monday by the organizers of the 2028 Olympic Games, and accepted en bloc on Friday by the IOC executive meeting in Bombay. But cricket, in its shortened form known as “T-20” compatible with the duration of the Games, is so popular throughout the Commonwealth that it can already hope to be continued at the 2032 Olympic Games in Brisbane, before perhaps be to definitively integrate the Olympic program.
Especially since India, host of this IOC session, is also the largest country to have never hosted the Olympic Games, and has been considering for several months to apply for the 2036 edition around the city of Ahmedabad, whose huge cricket stadium can accommodate up to 130,000 people.
At the suggestion of the Californian organizers, the IOC also validated the registration of baseball/softball, returning after the Tokyo 2020 Olympics, squash, “flag football” – a non-tackle variant of American football – and lacrosse. , a team sport derived from Native American cultures.
The new arrivals bring the number of sports on the Los Angeles program to 35 or even 36, a record, since the IOC has at the same time confirmed the maintenance of two disciplines in the spotlight – modern pentathlon and weightlifting –, while further delaying his decision on boxing.
“We want boxing on the program. We have no problem with boxing or boxers, just a huge problem with its governing body,” Thomas Bach clarified. The IOC has in fact definitively withdrawn its recognition from the international federation (IBA) after a cascade of scandals, and is waiting to see if World Boxing, a young organization initiated by the American federation, manages to bring together enough countries to replace it.
