Should Cricket Be A Part Of The Olympics?

[Cricketfan96]

I thought that we should have a thread on PC about if cricket should be a part of Olympics. It is a interesting topic to talk about also i think cricket should be a part of Olympics seen as Olympics is a sport thing, so is cricket!

 

[Skater]

Would only really work with the under 19s taking part, but even then the usual cricket following public won't be as interested and to a lot of the world the sport will remain unfathomable.

 

[Satan666]

Yeah it should be there, heard something recently about the ICC taking a proposal to the IOC with regards to same, the competition was based on the T20 format, maybe the next Olympics cricket will be there.

 

[Cricketfan96]

Last Olympics i didn't hear people saying cricket should be a part of Olympics but this time i know loads of people who have said it such as, Me

 

[Sami Kumar]

i would really like cricket to be a part of the olympics.

 

[puddleduck]

I think it could be a good addition really. A gold medal would be the 2nd biggest reward in Cricket after the World Cup? With so many series and no universally accepted system of ranking teams, why not have a second focal point for success that isn't the Champions Trophy.

 

[SaiSrini]

Maybe we should scrap the T20 World Cup, and have a T20 tournament featuring all countries within the Olympics with the winning team getting gold, the runner up getting silver and a play off between 3 and 4 to determine bronze.

 

[sifter132]

Yeah I support the idea - definitely. Especially if it's T20 cricket as it's good promotion for the sport, quick to get through a programme of matches, and it allows the lesser nations their best chance at glory. Those things counter the traditional arguments against cricket: it's boring; takes too long to play; and only a handful of countries could win it.

If not the Olympics, it should CERTAINLY be in the Commonwealth Games - if they can play Rugby 7s with none of the big stars they can play T20 cricket. After that we can worry about whether the big name players showed up or not. I'd like to think it would be a priority, and not turn into lame U-23 stuff like Olympic soccer for example.

 

[War]

I think it certainly should be in the Olympics. England being its inventors i reckon should have pushed hard to get it involved in this Olympics to let the world see it more.

Alot of crap sports are at the Olympics, so cricket deserves to be their.

Only problem i see going forward is that i think the West Indies may have to break up to help to expand the competition.

 

[MUFC1987]

Nope, no way it should be a part. Just like football shouldn't be. The Olympics is the pinnacle for a lot of athletes, whether it be a track and field athlete, a swimmer, a cyclist, a hockey player, whatever. The Olympics is the number one thing that they want to win and rightfully so. For sports like Cricket and Football, the World Cups will always take precedent, meaning that the Olympics means very little, which is wrong.

 

[War]

Nope, no way it should be a part. Just like football shouldn't be. The Olympics is the pinnacle for a lot of athletes, whether it be a track and field athlete, a swimmer, a cyclist, a hockey player, whatever. The Olympics is the number one thing that they want to win and rightfully so. For sports like Cricket and Football, the World Cups will always take precedent, meaning that the Olympics means very little, which is wrong.

Just because it isn't the pinnacle, that doesn't mean it should be part of the Olympics.

The idea of the Olympics is a celebration of all world sports and football being the world game has to be involved in that and the cricket world too, even if their own individual world sports, world cups - may mean more.

 

[MUFC1987]

No, the 'idea' if you really want to use that term, isn't to celebrate sports and have some big party proclaiming about how great everything is. The Olympics is about being the highest level of competition. It happens every 4 years and is special. Just like the World Cup is in football. For 4 years you have that right to be called the best in the World at what you do. Whether that be Usain Bolt or the Spanish football team. If you bring Cricket into the Olympics, you bring in a second tier competition (just like the Olympics is in football), which is against the very mantra of what the Olympic games are all about.

Do the Olympic Gold Medal winners in Football get called the best in the World? No, the World Cup winners do, which would be exactly the same in Cricket. And that's without getting into the fact that the pinnacle of the sport to most people (Test cricket) wouldn't even be used for the games, making it an even more diluted version of the sport.

 

[puddleduck]

Yeah watching the greatest Tennis player of all time cry when he won a doubles gold medal in Bejing really highlights your point...

 

[MUFC1987]

Yeah watching the greatest Tennis player of all time cry when he won a doubles gold medal in Bejing really highlights your point...

Did I miss there being a Tennis World Cup? Because the last time I checked, they just had Slams, which is entirely different to Football and Cricket. The Olympics in Tennis means something to the players, even if not entirely to the organisers (who give it low ranking points), it's entirely different.

Just how much did the Asian teams embrace Cricket at the Asian Games in 2010? Answer that and tell me what it would mean and what would happen.

 

[Sahil 7]

i would have loved to see cricket to be a part of the olympics may be this should happen in next olympics and the format should be t20 like fast and furious