Australia pushed to get cricket at the Olympics. A woeful World Cup has put their spot at risk

2 weeks ago 2

Australia’s Twenty20 World Cup pratfall in Sri Lanka risks costing it a place in cricket’s long-awaited return to the Olympics in Los Angeles in 2028.

Having entered the tournament comfortably ahead of New Zealand in the world rankings that will determine automatic qualification places at the end of the Cup, Australia’s early elimination has opened the door for the Black Caps to overtake them.

Australia were beaten by Zimbabwe and Sri Lanka at the World Cup.

Based on ranking calculations that the competing teams were still looking into on Wednesday, the Black Caps can now earn Olympics qualification by venturing to the semi-finals or beyond.

New Zealand have a strong track record of doing so, getting to at least the tournament semis in 2007, 2016, 2021 and 2022.

Should that eventuate, Australia would be tossed into a dog-eat-dog qualification tournament with multiple other second-ranked regional teams for the last place in the six-team men’s T20 event in LA. The Olympic rankings cut-off was recently agreed at ICC level to be the end of this World Cup, with final IOC approval still pending.

New Zealand’s cricketers are eager to make the most of the opportunity, having long resigned themselves to the prospect of facing the steep road to qualify from second spot in Oceania. “We always presumed that would be us,” said an NZ Cricket official.

The Olympics will also host a six-team women’s event, with Australia to contest the T20 World Cup in England later this year.

A member of the Australian selection panel is due to speak to media from Sri Lanka later on Wednesday.

Missing qualification for the Olympics would be a disaster for the Australian men’s team, after years of advocacy by Cricket Australia for sport’s inclusion in the global sporting jamboree.

Steve Smith and Pat Cummins are among numerous Australian cricketers who have expressed a strong desire to be part of cricket’s Olympics return, more than a century after its sole appearance at the Games.

“My main goal is to get in the team when the Olympics is rolling around,” Smith said recently. “I’d be keen to do that. That’d be pretty cool. So, keep doing what I’m doing and you never know.”

As far back as 2007, CA commissioned a report examining the value for cricket in the Olympics in T20 format, with the aim of getting it in by 2020.

Opposition from England and India was ultimately turned around for cricket’s inclusion to be greenlighted for LA. It will then be played in Brisbane in 2032, while India remains a chance to host the Games in 2036.

“Those of us who spent 20 years against the odds getting cricket back into the Olympic program for the first time in over a century would regard it as mismanagement of epic proportions for Australia to fail to qualify for the world’s largest sports event in global sport’s biggest market,” said Phillip Pope, author of the 2007 CA report.

More to come

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