Will Cricket Be Confined to a Corner of the Commonwealth Field?

As the current chairman of the International Cricket Council (ICC) is unwilling to seek an extension, the governing body is preparing to welcome a new chairman. The buzz in the media is around two names: Colin Graves, the current chairman of the England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) and Sourav Ganguly, the former Indian captain who is president of the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI).

The incoming chairman will have to deal with a one-of-its-kind pandemic or the post-pandemic situation. Starting cricketing events afresh will be a challenge at a time when some of the biggest sports stars have been criticised for arranging invitational tournaments. It will also be interesting to see whether the focus will on regaining the revenue lost due to the crisis or to boost the interest in cricket and popularise the game across the world.

During the past decade, the ICC’s approach has been to commercialise the game’s popularity in certain Commonwealth countries. This was prominently highlighted during last summer’s World Cup. Changes made to the format of the ICC’s most coveted tournament either favoured the top-ranked teams or helped milk more revenue.

In the 2019 edition, which was held in the UK, the round-robin format made a comeback. This had previously been used only in the 1992 World Cup. Observers suggested that this format was revived to make sure that all the top-ranked teams play each other, increasing viewership and revenue.

Until 1996, all the World Cups had a group format followed by semi-finals and the final. In 1996, the tournament also had a quarter-final stage. The super-six stage, introduced in the World Cups between 1999 and 2007, proved detrimental to the major contenders—as it proved in 2007, when both India and Pakistan failed to make it past the league stage. This saw the ICC lose a lot of sponsorship and advertising revenue, forcing it to revert to the time-tested group format followed by quarter-finals and semifinals in 2011 and 2015. 

Contracting instead of expanding

The first cricket World Cup in 1975 included two non-test playing nations – Sri Lanka and East Africa (consisting of Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania and Zambia). The aim was to develop the game and make it popular. The same intent was present in some subsequent World Cups, but it died a slow death.

This was starkly evident in the 2019 World Cup, when for the first time since its inception, not only were there no associate members featuring in the tournament but also saw two permanent members of the ICC failing to qualify. 

Among those missing were Zimbabwe and Kenya, who have provided an entertaining presence in the world cup. Perennially an underdog, the Zimbabwean cricket team which made its World Cup debut in 1983, found itself out of contention in 2019. Capable of upsetting the giants on its day, the country proceeded to the super-six stage in 1999 on the back of upset victories against both South Africa and India. Kenya, a team which beat the West Indies in the 1996 World Cup and reached the semifinal of the 2003 edition, met an even worse fate and lost its ODI membership.

The ICC has also not helped develop the game in associate member countries like the UAE, Hong Kong, Canada, Scotland, Ireland and Netherlands. These countries have been in and out of the World Cups but the sport has not gained a foothold in any of them.

Bangladesh is an exception to the norm and has improved in leaps and bounds by playing frequently against the top subcontinental teams over the past couple of decades. Recently, even Afghanistan has come up the ranks thanks to the BCCI’s generous offer to provide facilities that were denied to them back home due to the political turbulence.

Favouring the big teams

The route to qualifying for the World Cup also favours top-ranked teams like India, Australia, England and South Africa. The lower-ranked teams continue to be sidelined. For the 2019 World Cup, the top eight ranked teams qualified automatically, while the remaining two spots were filled after a closely fought contest featuring 10 teams. The rankings help teams that play more matches and also those teams that play and win against top oppositions. This leaves the minnows always lurking at the bottom of the table.

From Table 1, it is evident that the lower-ranked teams play very few games, of which even fewer are against the top teams.

Table 1: International games played by low ranked teams between the 2015 and 2019 World Cups

Even for a team like Bangladesh, which plays more matches, the devil lies in the details. Of the 374 matches played it played in the same period, only 127 (34%) were at away venues. More importantly, only 47 (12.5%) games were played outside the subcontinent. The situation for Afghanistan is worse. In a sport where ground conditions play an important role in deciding skill development and the outcome of the match, the minnows lack exposure.

Following football’s example

In contrast, the FIFA World Cup, which is one of the biggest sporting events, has been expanding. Only 16 teams competed in 1974, but it is now represented by 32. The 2026 edition will see the participation of 48 teams, enhancing its reputation of being a truly global tournament. FIFA’s attempts to develop and popularise the game in Asia, Africa and North America have ensured that the game no longer remains confined to Europe and South America.

Moreover, it is not always a given that the best teams will qualify for the World Cup. Instead, the teams need to prove their mettle in continental qualifying rounds, which ensures that every corner of the world is represented. In the words of legendary footballer Michel Platini, “If you don’t give the possibility to participate, they don’t improve.” Despite the numerous criticisms against FIFA’s administration, their success in globalising the sport is remarkable when compared to the ICC’s track record. 

Football’s popularity wasn’t achieved overnight. Over the years, both FIFA and football clubs have contributed to this process: FIFA by giving membership to more nations and ensuring their participation in the international arena and the clubs by scouting talent in countries that are not traditional footballing nations.

This has led to an increasing presence of foreign players in elite European leagues. In the 1974-75 season of the top divisions of English and Spanish domestic leagues, only 125 (24%) and 68 (17%) players were foreigners. The corresponding figures for the 2018-19 season saw a whopping jump to 368 (62%) and 220 (37%) respectively.

The governing rules also do not unfairly restrict the selection of foreign players, with good representation from all continents (Table 1, Figure 1 and 2). The increase in players from nations outside the elite countries ultimately helped increase the popularity of football in those countries, resulting in more and more players choosing to pursue the sport. 

Table 1: Restrictions on foreign players in elite football leagues

In cricket, unlike football, the intent to develop the sport in non-elite nations has not been visible. The respective cricket boards are also to be blamed since, in their quest for raking in the moolah, they have ruled against participating in qualifiers for the World Cup (which is mandatory for all nations except the host in football).

The boards have also turned their focus towards developing domestic leagues. All the prominent cricket boards now have their own T20 leagues. The rules of these leagues also favour domestic players. The policy of a minimum number of domestic players, though well-intentioned, has done little to globalise the sport despite considerably improving the domestic wards’ performance and their exposure to world-class players.

In the IPL, one of the two major cricketing domestic leagues, 35% of players are foreigners. Australia’s BBL has a meagre 11% foreign participation.

While the IPL allows only 8 foreign players in the squad and 4 players in the playing 11, the BBL has a limit of 6 and 2 respectively. The rest of the top leagues are no better either.

From Figure 3, we can see that most of the foreign players who participate in the IPL are from the top-ranked nations. This leaves little room for players from lower-ranked nations to make a name for themselves.

An overburdened calendar

Another issue is that the cricket calendar is filled with bilateral tours between the top nations, which include games in all three formats. Most players are already overburdened with their national duties. They may not have the time to participate in domestic leagues, where there is scope for more players to feature. Thanks to India’s commercial power, the ICC provides a window for the IPL to be conducted but this luxury is not granted to other leagues.

This is in stark contrast to the cricket calendar of the 1990s, when lower-ranked teams as the third or the fourth entrant in a triangular or quadrangular series involving top teams.

FIFA’s 2019 calendar, on the other hand, included only 50 days for national duty. Continental tournaments like the Copa America, Gold Cup and African Cup of Nations are scheduled largely in the professional leagues’ off-season. Top football players spend 80% of their year representing their club, whereas the figure stands at 20% for top cricket players.

A club football player can still make a career for himself without representing a nation, whereas most cricketers solely rely on their inclusion in the national team for success. Though the genesis of club cricket and club football isn’t very dissimilar, their growth trajectories, societal and economic influence couldn’t be more different.

The COVID-19 crisis has halted business as usual and has provided ICC with some time to think. Sooner or later, the world will bounce back from this crisis. When it does, will the new ICC chairman take steps to make the sport more globalised? If cricket has to become a truly global sport, the ICC has to take a leaf out of FIFA’s book. It is time for the hegemony of a handful of members to end. All 105 ICC members (12 permanent and 93 associate) should be represented in major cricket tournaments and the governing body must make efforts to include teams from across the globe.

Otherwise, cricket will likely be confined to a corner of the commonwealth field and a handful of nations will continue to dominate and aspire to get larger shares of the pie.

Prashant Premkumar is a doctoral scholar at IIM Kozhikode. He can be reached at nairp08fpm@iimk.ac.in. Jimut Bahan Chakrabarty is assistant professor at Adani Institute of Infrastructure Management. He can be reached at jimutb08fpm@iimk.ac.in. Deepak Dhayanithy is associate professor at IIM Kozhikode. He can be reached at deepak@iimk.ac.in.