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London, August 13 (HS). The England Cricket Board (ECB) and Cricket Scotland have begun talks about plans to field men's and women's Great Britain (GB) cricket teams at the 2028 Olympic Games in Los Angeles.
Cricket will return to the Olympics for the first time since 1900 after its inclusion was confirmed late last year. Details are yet to be confirmed, but the ICC has proposed six-team T20 tournaments for both the women's and men's competitions, which are expected to last around a week and will likely be played consecutively rather than simultaneously.
Qualification details have yet to be confirmed, but the ICC T20 rankings will be used to some extent. Most countries will compete in their usual style, but if England qualify they will play as Great Britain, as at the rest of the Olympics. This opens up the possibility for some Scottish players, such as Brendan McMullen or Sarah and Katherine Bryce, to compete.
The ECB and Cricket Scotland have held preliminary discussions about working together on the proposed GB cricket teams. Cricket Scotland is pushing for active involvement in their operations and is keen to contribute players and staff, but the ECB will be the designated governing body of the teams.
An ECB spokesperson told ESPNcricinfo: “With the Los Angeles Olympics still four years away, it’s still very early stages, but we’re talking to Team GB and Cricket Scotland about the next steps. Once again Great Britain’s Olympians have captured the national imagination with their exploits in Paris this year, and we look forward to working together to compete when cricket returns to the Olympic stage in 2028.”
He said: “The target for women and men to achieve gender equality by England and Wales in 2026 and 2030 is [टी20] “With the hosting of the World Cup, this is another great opportunity to grow the sport and inspire more people to develop a love for cricket.”
“We have good experience in golf, rugby and women's football of how the Four Nations can be organised,” British Olympic Association chief executive Andy Anson said on Monday. [इंग्लैंड, स्कॉटलैंड, वेल्स और उत्तरी आयरलैंड] We can come together and nominate one country as the main governing body and work together with other countries. So I think cricket will be like that too.”
Anson, who is also Lancashire chairman, said, “The ECB will be at the centre of this. They will have to work closely with Cricket Scotland to make sure it happens properly. We will help them come together and sign agreements to form a single national governing body, as we have done in those other sports. We are working closely with the ECB to make them a fully-fledged National Olympic Committee member.”
Team GB is officially the Great Britain and Northern Ireland Olympic team, and athletes from Northern Ireland can choose to compete for either Team GB or Ireland. But since cricket is organised across Ireland, prominent Northern Ireland cricketers such as Mark Adair and Paul Stirling are unlikely to nominate themselves for Team GB.
The venue for cricket events at the 2028 Olympics has yet to be confirmed. The Los Angeles Knight Riders and Major League Cricket plan to build a stadium at Irvine's Great Park, while the Oakland Coliseum has also been floated as an option.