The IOC General Assembly in Mumbai, India, paved the way for cricket to return to the Los Angeles Olympics. The plenary also voted in favor of including four other sports in the Olympic program. Prime Minister Narendra Modi also announced that India will bid for the 2036 Summer Olympics.
The plenary session of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) has approved the program proposals of the organizers of the 2028 Summer Games in Los Angeles and cleared the way for the Olympic cricket comeback in Mumbai.
The sport, which is particularly popular in India, will return after 128 years, and baseball/softball, flag football, lacrosse and squash will also be included in the program. This was decided by the IOC members on Monday.
With the addition of four new team sports, the LA Summer Games will break the previous limit of 10,500 athletes.
No sport is likely to have to give way; both Modern Pentathlon, with the discipline of steeplechase instead of show jumping, and weightlifting, following an anti-doping reform, already received the blessing of the Executive Board around IOC President Thomas Bach on Friday. The decision on boxing is pending.
INDIA’S 2036 OLYMPICS BID
According to a report by industry portal “insidethegames,” the IOC’s TV revenue in India from cricket increases from $20 million to $150 million. India is seen as the market of the future, with Prime Minister Narendra Modi announcing an Olympic bid for 2036.
India will “turn over every stone” in its efforts to organize the 2036 Games, the 73-year-old assured Saturday. The IOC session was held in the world’s most populous country for the first time in 40 years.
Cricket was Olympic for the only time so far in 1900 in Paris, then with only one match between France and Great Britain. Squash had last made four unsuccessful bids and is celebrating its Olympic premiere in Los Angeles, as is flag football, the disembodied version of American football.
Lacrosse and baseball/softball are both returning to the Olympics in 2028, after being absent for several Games.
“We want LA 2028 to be a springboard for these five sports,” said Casey Wasserman, head of the organizing committee.
