It looks as if Cricket will continue to be absent from Commonwealth Games until the 2018 Games in Australia after the International Cricket Council (ICC) rejected an invitation from the governing body of the multi-sport event.
Prince Tunku Imran of Malaysia, the chairman of the Commonwealth Games Federation, formally approached the ICC in 2012 to consider participating in the 2014 Glasgow Games, which began on Wednesday and also the next one in 2018.
“There were discussions about the inclusion of men’s and women’s Twenty20 cricket in both the 2014 and 2018 Commonwealth Games but neither of these came to fruition,” an ICC spokesperson told Reuters in a statement.
“However, cricket is scheduled to feature in the Commonwealth Youth Games in St Lucia in 2017.”
South Africa won the gold medal when cricket, in its 50-over format, made its only appearance at the quadrennial event featuring mostly former British colonies during the 1998 Kuala Lumpur Games.
While Twenty20 is considered a fit for multi-sport events, the ICC currently holds a 20-over World Cup every two years.
The dense 2015-2023 cricketing calendar and the 2018 Games, scheduled Apr 4-15 at Gold Coast, clashing with the lucrative Indian Premier League are also believed to be major hurdles for the sport’s inclusion in the event.
