Why is Sports like cricket and rugby not in the olympics but softball is even

[lilac_monkey12]

though more people play them?? Its only america who really play softball but rugby and cricket there are many countries who play them and is far more popular.
And don't america always win it, other countries don't have a chance where as in cricket and rugby at least 10 countries have an equal chance of wining
And cricket is more exciting than softball
Its not just europe who play it its asia, australiasia and africa who play it and there are top teams in those continents. Its good for countries who don't get that many medals to have more of a chance of getting some playing a sport that they're good at.

[gatillero]

My idea is they wanna pick more global sports so to make the better competition possible...Theres not much rugby or cricket being played in the us or even china,just europe...

[PabloG]

Notice the Cricket World Cup and the Rugby world cup are tiny for instance in comparison to the Football World Cup... These 2 sports are simply not popular enough for the Olympics and need huge venues and a lot of time. Even 20/20 cricket takes too long and need huge venues.

If you think that baseball/softball is played by North, Central & South America - as well as a lot of Asia and minimally in Europe and Australasia - then it is clearly very popular.

[Know It All]

because we don't play those dumb sports in america and we run this planet. we're trying to get soccer out of the olympics too

[203]

Do we seriously want cricket as an Olympic sport? There are already enough "watching paint dry" events as it is and the whole event only lasts two weeks anyway. That's only just long enough for the first over of the first match ;o)

Rugby would be a good one though. There is a sufficient international representation to make it viable. Rugby Sevens would be even better. Blistering fast and you could have the entire competition finished and medals awarded in a day.

[mark]

Says who?

Softball is played in many countries around the globe.

There are many sports that could be included in the Olympics but the IOC's stance is to keep the number of athletes to a manageable number. They also want to keep the most popular events in the program. (I'm not sure who recommends to them what the most popular sports are though).

Now, I don't really see them including cricket any time soon due to the constraints of the sport. Are you talking about all day events? Plus cricket is not played world wide either.

You have a better argument for rugby though.

However, both of these sports are heavily controlled by just a few different countries. They would have a better chance of being adopted if more countries played these sports and the championships were not always isolated to simply India, Pakistan, Australia, South Africa, and Great Britain.

You have a legitimate argument though.

PS: Baseball and Softball are being removed from the agenda after this Olympiad. They didn't last long either. So your argument must be strong with the IOC.

[Colonel]

I wonder why they have removed Baseball from the agenda, but yet there is table tennis, bad-mitten, handball, and synchronized diving,,,but no cricket or rugby.

[K B]

If it wasn't played by more countries, then there would only be one team in the Olympics. Since we know there are many countries fielding teams, then it stands to reason that more than just the US plays it. Far more people play softball and baseball than cricket.


k

[emily261208]

Because the sports have to be internationally recognised so that all the countrys have a chance to put out a team.

[Eagle1969]

I'm all for Cricket being an olympic sport in some version or other.

Perhaps the IOC tend to be old people that do not want to change the sports that have been historically played over so many years.