Unpopular Cricket Opinions

[icyman]

This would be ideal, but if the ICC is worried the broadcasters will be mad at India potentially getting a single game (highly unlikely to happen, but still possible), then maybe they can make it a double knockout? India have had a stellar record in ODI tournaments the last decade and a half, so giving them a two-game net virtually secures them as finalists, making the broadcasters and ICC very happy while sort of maintaining the chaos of a knockout format.

In 2000,they had 9 teams that played in the Knockout-India got an extra game versus Kenya, was it then?
In 1998, I believe it was NZ who had the extra game.

The KO format is fun and unpredictable and that's what gives each game a thrilling edge. In terms of the co-existence of formats and the ICC's passive-aggressiveness for having a tournament each year, this can be easily accommodated:

2027 CWC (14 to 16 teams, groups of 2 each and then straight away in the KO- QF-SF-Final)
2028 WT20 (20 team event was a bit too much for me this time round. 16 is optimal. If you want 20, have double-headers each day, cannot be bothered to keep up)
2029 KO-CT (mandate it to be held in an upcoming country, in order to spread the game. And make them participate- for. e.g. China/Japan. They'll get slaughtered ,but why not)
2030- WTC (has to be on a 4 year cycle. The finals can be a Best of 3 between the Top 2 teams OR something on the lines of the Super Series held in 2005)

 

[icyman]

Cricket in Olympics makes no sense if you are going to limit it to only 6 nations. I get it that the game can be long- Yes, T20 games now can take as much as 5-6 hours to end. But for pure entertainment and spread of the game, we must embrace the T10 format for the Olympics. The game rules are need to be tweaked for this specific format.

Time: ICC rules stipulate 14 overs per hour. Ideally 10-over games should be wrapped up in 90 minutes.

Number of player: Make it exciting, have only 7/8 players on the ground.

Bowling limits: Max 5 overs per bowler, gotta give back something to them.

Fielding Restrictions: None, why do you need any when you already have 3 less players?

Back to Cricket in the Olympics. Have 20-24 nations competing. Can be straight knockouts, if needed.

 

[wasteyouryouth]

Cricket in Olympics makes no sense if you are going to limit it to only 6 nations. I get it that the game can be long- Yes, T20 games now can take as much as 5-6 hours to end. But for pure entertainment and spread of the game, we must embrace the T10 format for the Olympics. The game rules are need to be tweaked for this specific format.

Time: ICC rules stipulate 14 overs per hour. Ideally 10-over games should be wrapped up in 90 minutes.

Number of player: Make it exciting, have only 7/8 players on the ground.

Bowling limits: Max 5 overs per bowler, gotta give back something to them.

Fielding Restrictions: None, why do you need any when you already have 3 less players?

Back to Cricket in the Olympics. Have 20-24 nations competing. Can be straight knockouts, if needed.

I don't think it's the ICC's decision how many teams they can have. From the IOC's perspective they want Indian eyeballs so they can squeeze more out of advertisers.

They also have to accomodate a substantial number of people for a team sport.

 

[Supreme General]

Cricket in Olympics makes no sense if you are going to limit it to only 6 nations. I get it that the game can be long- Yes, T20 games now can take as much as 5-6 hours to end. But for pure entertainment and spread of the game, we must embrace the T10 format for the Olympics. The game rules are need to be tweaked for this specific format.

Time: ICC rules stipulate 14 overs per hour. Ideally 10-over games should be wrapped up in 90 minutes.

Number of player: Make it exciting, have only 7/8 players on the ground.

Bowling limits: Max 5 overs per bowler, gotta give back something to them.

Fielding Restrictions: None, why do you need any when you already have 3 less players?

Back to Cricket in the Olympics. Have 20-24 nations competing. Can be straight knockouts, if needed.

This makes zero sense whatsoever.

IOC can only allow x number of athletes per sport, in this case it is 90 for both men’s and women’s so for squads that is 6 teams of 15. The women’s bit is also a major limiter on the amount of teams you can introduce and still make it competitive as they have to be only level playing fields in terms of competitors especially with the new IOC president Kirsty Coventry running on a string pro-women athlete equality platform. Also are not 24 Olympic committees and respective cricket boards (e.g well no Scotland that’s part of Team GB, each of the Caribbean islands that make up the West Indies don’t have strength in depth to be ultra competitive but you could see one of them like Barbados did at the commonwealth games in 2022) really to who have the funding and personnel to send them to LA along with capacity in the Olympic village to allow that. Ultimately, this is an IOC led initiative, it’s for the Olympic’s benefit not cricket and to facilitate India’s increasing sports market and hopefully interest them in to putting forward bids for future Olympics. Also as a new sport, they won’t allocate too much calendar space for 20-24 team tournaments, football gets 16 slots for men and 12 for women so would cricket be even more than a legacy sport that’s many times more popular. As well, it’s an American Olympics so they are also introducing/re-introducing flag football, Squash, lacrosse and baseball/softball. All of these including Cricket are not core Olympic sports so a less athlete allotment and B no guarantee to be picked up next time round but I would assume cricket is safe due to 2032 being in Brisbane.


Then the whole change the format idea is ludicrous, no other sport gets introduced with a whole different system to what it normally gets played as, rugby sevens, Basketball 3x3 etc are all sports and codes in their own right well before the Olympics with their own championships. It’s either belittling or a grandiose ego to say cricket must be different.

 

[icyman]

I don't think it's the ICC's decision how many teams they can have. From the IOC's perspective they want Indian eyeballs so they can squeeze more out of advertisers.

I think the advertising contracts for the IOC would hinge more on other games. Don't think 6 cricket teams(even if India is included) would substantially increase the valuation of the TV/Digital rights for them.

IOC can only allow x number of athletes per sport, in this case it is 90 for both men’s and women’s so for squads that is 6 teams of 15. The women’s bit is also a major limiter on the amount of teams you can introduce and still make it competitive as they have to be only level playing fields in terms of competitors especially with the new IOC president Kirsty Coventry running on a string pro-women athlete equality platform. Also are not 24 Olympic committees and respective cricket boards (e.g well no Scotland that’s part of Team GB, each of the Caribbean islands that make up the West Indies don’t have strength in depth to be ultra competitive but you could see one of them like Barbados did at the commonwealth games in 2022) really to who have the funding and personnel to send them to LA along with capacity in the Olympic village to allow that. Ultimately, this is an IOC led initiative, it’s for the Olympic’s benefit not cricket and to facilitate India’s increasing sports market and hopefully interest them in to putting forward bids for future Olympics. Also as a new sport, they won’t allocate too much calendar space for 20-24 team tournaments, football gets 16 slots for men and 12 for women so would cricket be even more than a legacy sport that’s many times more popular. As well, it’s an American Olympics so they are also introducing/re-introducing flag football, Squash, lacrosse and baseball/softball. All of these including Cricket are not core Olympic sports so a less athlete allotment and B no guarantee to be picked up next time round but I would assume cricket is safe due to 2032 being in Brisbane.

I admit I am not aware of the IOC rules in terms of number of athletes allowed per sport. If what you have mentioned is true, then the number of teams in cricket will have to be reduced. While football does get a higher number of slots, cricket could also get the same, if the popularity increases.

Then the whole change the format idea is ludicrous, no other sport gets introduced with a whole different system to what it normally gets played as, rugby sevens, Basketball 3x3 etc are all sports and codes in their own right well before the Olympics with their own championships. It’s either belittling or a grandiose ego to say cricket must be different.

Not belittling the sport here, by any means. If you need more teams and less games in less time, you need to make changes to the existing format. While the idea may sound ludicrous, T10 might just get a massive boost for the Olympics-one could argue in favour of Hong Kong sixes as well. The ICC needs to ensure the spread of the game by making it appeal to the masses. So, if that means introducing a new format, there's nothin to lose.

P.S- T10 cannot be included and neither can HK Sixes. The IOC rules stipulate a that the sport/ format needs to have aWorld Championship. So, that rules it out.