Los Angeles 2028 Olympics: Cricket, boxing not on provisional sports list

Cricket was not part of the 28 sports that were provisionally added to the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics Programme by the International Olympic Committee (IOC) on Thursday.

Athletics, archery, badminton, basketball, tennis and wrestling are some of the sports that have been provisionally added to the LA28 Olympics programme.

Cricket has made only one appearance at the Olympic Games, at the 1900 Paris Games, where it was played between two countries.

Cricket was also a part of the 1998 Commonwealth Games but hasn’t featured in any other multi-sport events since then.

The sport, however, will be returning to the Commonwealth Games in the next edition - Birmingham 2022 - in the form of a women’s Twenty20 tournament.

In August, the International Cricket Council (ICC) had launched preparations for a bid to have cricket included in the Olympics.

The IOC takes into consideration the popularity of the sport, cost and complexity, uniqueness and relevance for young people as some of the factors before including them in the Olympic programme.

The International Cricket Council (ICC), which is the global governing body for international cricket, currently has 12 full members and 94 associate members.

Boxing, weightlifting, modern pentathlon miss cut

The IOC has also excluded boxing, weightlifting and modern pentathlon from the LA28 Initial Sports Programme for now.

India have three medals in boxing and two in weightlifting at the Olympics, one of each came at Tokyo 2020 earlier this year.

The IOC included youth-focused sports like skateboarding, sport climbing and surfing in the programme, following their successful debut at Tokyo 2020. All three are already a part of the programme for the 2024 Paris Olympics.

The list with all 28 sports will be submitted for approval at the upcoming IOC session in February next year.