Cricket has never had a bigger window and a smaller door
On the surface, cricket is booming. Beneath it, the game’s governing body is quietly suffocating the sport.
There is a paradox at the heart of the modern world that psychologists call hyper-connected loneliness. The idea is fairly simply: the more connected we become, the lonelier some of us feel. Not despite the connection, but because of it. Because connectivity without inclusion is not connection at all. It is instead a window into a room you cannot enter.
Cricket in 2026 is experiencing its own version of this paradox. The game has never been more connected. The IPL is worth eye-watering amounts of money. Cricket is going to the Olympics for the first time since 1900. The WPL is one of the most-watched women’s leagues in the world. By every available commercial metric, the game is blossoming.
And yet, Ireland could fly to southern Africa in 2027 and return home before the 50-over World Cup proper even begins. The ODI Super League, the one structural mechanism that gave associate nations guaranteed fixtures against full members, has been canned. And Afghanistan, Zimbabwe and Ireland are all still waiting to join the World Test Championship, the ICC’s flagship event for Test cricket.
On the surface, the game has never looked more connected. But remember, connectivity without inclusion is a window into a room you cannot enter. And the ICC, at its annual conference in Edinburgh, has only succeeded in making the window larger and the door smaller.
THE ICC’S REVAMP
The 2027 ODI World Cup will feature 14 teams. The ICC says so. Its Orwellian press release says so. But the reality is that three of those teams — the 12th, 13th and 14th ranked qualifiers — will play a preliminary round against each other, with only one progressing to the main 12-team group stage. Two nations will fly to southern Africa and board a plane home before the tournament begins in earnest.
Edward Fitzgibbon, who spent five years at the ICC working on the World Cricket League qualification pathway, recently outlined the issue. “That isn’t a 14-team World Cup,” he explained. “It’s a 12-team World Cup with the final qualifying round moved inside the tournament gates so the press release can still say 14.” He noted that in the 2015 World Cup, Ireland, Afghanistan, Scotland and the UAE all qualified and played the same six-match group stage as every other team. In 2027, two qualified nations may play a third of that, then go home.
There will be no quarter-finals. The format adds one team to the round-robin phase, and dramatically increases the probability of an additional India-Pakistan game, cricket’s economic defibrillator. The ICC did not state this motivation in its press release, of course. The governing body never acknowledges the elephant in the room. The ICC’s stated objective — creating greater context, competitiveness and consequence — is not false. It is simply incomplete.
The ODI Super League has been scrapped for the 2027 qualifying cycle. In its place, the ICC has “strongly encouraged” full members to organise more matches between their A sides and associate members. Encouraged. Not mandated, not funded, and certainly not structured. The ICC, in its wisdom, has replaced a sensible structure with a polite suggestion.
THE SURFACE-LEVEL HEALTH
Cricket is more commercially valuable than it has ever been. The IPL generates billions every year from broadcasting and sponsorships. Reliance Industries, the multinational conglomerate led by Mukesh Ambani, owns franchises in India, England, South Africa, the UAE and the United States simultaneously. A tech consortium, led by the CEOs of Google and Microsoft, owns 49 percent of London Spirit. Hundreds of millions of dollars are being invested in Major League Cricket in the US, while Saudi Arabia is positioning itself as cricket’s next frontier.
The franchise model has transformed players’ livelihoods, cultivated audiences in new markets and sparked genuine excitement in countries that previously had no serious cricket infrastructure. The WPL has changed what is possible for women cricketers in ways that are tangible and lasting. The Hundred’s serendipitous double-header model gave women’s cricket access to stadiums and fans it had never previously reached, too.
But, it must be stressed, commercial value and institutional health are not the same thing. The game is valuable because of cricket’s existing fans and existing markets. The ICC’s job is to use that value to grow cricket and establish new markets. And on that measure — the measure that determines whether cricket is a genuinely global sport or just a commercially sophisticated niche product — the ICC is failing, miserably.
THE ECONOMIC INEQUALITY
The BCCI receives 38.5 percent of the ICC’s annual revenue; approximately $230 million per year from a $600 million pool. The ECB earns 6.89 percent. Cricket Australia earns 6.25 percent. The remaining nine full members share less than 50 percent between them. The associate members, meanwhile, share 11.19 percent of the total pot.
The governing body’s criteria for revenue distribution — commercial contribution, cricket history, performance at ICC events over 16 years, and equal Full Member status — are intended to look objective while concretising the status quo. Commercial contribution is weighted at 85.3 percent in favour of the BCCI. The justification is that India contributes 70-80 percent of cricket’s total commercial economy. And that is entirely true. It is also a deeply flawed model because it limits opportunities to develop commercial value in new, potentially lucrative markets. In essence, the ICC is prioritising short-term extraction over long-term growth.
WHAT IS BEING LOST
Ireland. A nation whose cricket was built almost entirely on ODI World Cup moments, like the improbable victories over Pakistan in 2007 and England in 2011. Moments that spawned a generation of cricketers and a community of fans who might otherwise never have encountered the sport. Nathan Johns, who covers Irish cricket, has stated the problem plainly. “To become anything more than a fringe sport,” he explained, “Irish cricket needs regular success at World Cups that carry some sort of historical weight. That goal has just gotten all the harder.”
Under the new format, Ireland could navigate a tricky global qualifier, earn one of 14 World Cup places, fly to southern Africa, and go home after two matches without ever entering the main tournament. The ICC will count them as participants. The press release will say 14 teams. But, as Johns explained: “That is not qualifying for a mundial. It’s qualifying for another qualifier.”
By contrast, FIFA is discussing plans to expand its World Cup to 64 teams. The debate is about whether more is genuinely better. Cricket is doing the opposite. Fitzgibbon identified what football understands that cricket keeps overlooking. “The World Cup is not only a broadcast product, it’s the incentive structure for the entire global game,” he wrote. “Cape Verde reaching a World Cup matters for far more than the four matches Cape Verde got to play. It tells 40 other federations the pathway is real, that investment produces progress, and that the top table isn’t permanently reserved for the same eight names.” Cricket needs that signal, but the 2027 format sends the opposite message.
THE DIRECTION OF TRAVEL
Graeme Smith, the former South African captain and the commissioner of SA20, has been refreshingly honest in his assessment of the global landscape. “If you look at the direction cricket is heading,” Smith explained, “the game will probably settle with four or five tier-one leagues globally, each occupying its own window in the international calendar.” Tellingly, the ICC’s role in that future is not mentioned.
The ICC is not resisting this vision, though. It is instead planning to participate in it. The World Club T20, a proposed franchise tournament, is edging closer to reality. The institution that is supposed to govern international cricket is now planning to enter the franchise jungle. At the same time, the institution whose job is to protect associate nations’ access to consequential cricket is canning the concept that provided it.
The ICC is not an institution that has lost its way. It is, in fact, an institution that knows exactly where it is going and how it is getting there. The ICC has decided, unforgivably, that associate nations and genuine global growth are not part of the destination.
WHAT GENUINE REFORM WOULD LOOK LIKE
Cricket does not need the ICC to be perfect. It needs the ICC to have a vision and an ambition that extends beyond the next broadcasting cycle. It needs a governing body that treats the World Cup as an incentive structure rather than a money-spinning broadcast product. It needs a revenue distribution model that invests in the development of new markets rather than rewarding the dominance of existing ones. It needs a qualification pathway that means what it says.
None of this requires significant sacrifice from the BCCI, the ECB or Cricket Australia. The game is generating more money than it has ever generated. There is enough. The question is who decides how it is distributed and what it is used for.
Cricket has never looked more connected, but its lesser-loved nations have rarely felt more neglected. The ICC made that window larger in Edinburgh and the door smaller. But, looking at the franchise valuations, the broadcast deals, the Olympic inclusion and the record-breaking viewership figures, you might not notice the door getting smaller at all.
That is precisely the point. That is precisely the paradox. And that is precisely why it matters.
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Here is my take on this:
- I feel sorry for the ICC for what it has become. It has unfortunately surrendered to the top cricket boards. And these boards have to come on the same platform with the ICC for global development.
- Currently, it is run and dominated by broadcasters' money. And this is where the actual problem arises. ICC has become spineless here, and it is the cricket boards that take the front call. If only the ICC could be run by serious people who want to run it as an organisation and have their own broadcasting channel. Also, the ICC's value has diminished due to a lack of control over franchise cricket. And because the money is coming from broadcasters who want more ROI, the number of ICC events has become frequent. At the same time, for the ICC, these events are important so that the money can be rotated to fund weaker nations, like the loan granted to the West Indies Cricket Board. They know test cricket is a must but is not generating money in most of the countries. Not all boards can afford to host test matches.
- If we look at the teams outside the top 3 and the associates, I feel a time will come when players will stop giving priority to the top-level cricket. Because, see, at the end, why would someone from Ireland wait for an opportunity to play Test cricket when they know they can do better with ETPL or other such leagues? Post-COVID, a lot of mindsets have changed in terms of the time value of money. The new generation of players will look to value their time in accordance with the money they are getting.
Re “The ICC’s job is to use that value to grow cricket and establish new markets.” (And similar sentiments. I agree that this *should* be ICC’s job, but not that it is.
ICC is an event management company, owned/run by a gathering of national boards, each representing their own interests, all running cricket to make money rather than making money to help run cricket. They have rejected proposed changes to make ICC an actual independent governing body - blocked by the powerful boards who stand to lose financially if it goes ahead. What else should we expect when business-folk are in charge and ICC is a members’ club?