Cricket in the US - An Exciting Future?

In 1751, the New York Gazette carried the story of the first public cricket match in North America; a game contested between a London side and a local eleven, the latter coming out on top in the historic contest.

This game took place 40 years before the first known mention of baseball in the continent, but it’s fair to say that most Americans have taken to the sport played on a diamond much more kindly; Major League Baseball pulled in an average crowd of 28,199 fans per game last season, but there isn’t a single professional cricket league in the entire nation.

However, cricket has begun to surge in popularity in the States, a place that the world’s 

second most popular sport has never quite been able to reach. 

Until now.

An influx of West Indian and South East Asian immigrants to North America has helped to create a buzz around cricket in the country.  But the game isn’t just played by expats in the US, others have embraced the sport too, with baseball comparisons being used to help beginners understand our wonderfully complicated game.

Cricket is one of the fastest growing sports in the States, with roughly 15 million fans and over 200,000 players; there is not a single State where the game isn’t played and in California, Washington DC, New York and Florida, the sport is especially widespread.  All that is needed is for that progress to be replicated around the rest of the vast country.

Admittedly, that will be no easy task. The United States is the 4th largest nation in the world by area and the 3^rd largest by population.

Perhaps cricket could take some lessons from soccer (or football, depending on which part of the globe you come from).

In 1994, the USA hosted its first Soccer World Cup, after outbidding Brazil and Morocco for the tournament’s hosting rights. Despite soccer being very much a minor sport in the country at the time, the 1994 World Cup was the most financially successful in the history of the competition. 3.6 million people turned up for the matches throughout the course of the tournament, a soccer world cup record that still stands to this day.

The Soccer World Cup managed to capture the imagination of Americans and put the sport firmly in the national conscience. In 1996, the first season of Major League Soccer took place and it has gone from strength to strength ever since; in 2019 a league record of 6,676,109 fans turned up to support their team.

There’s little doubt that the 1994 world cup was a huge catalyst for the subsequent growth of American soccer.

So, could cricket repeat the trick in the future?

Hosting one of the ICC’s major tournaments, such as the World Cup or World T20 in the States would be a bold move to take, given the nation is so new to the sport - but it could be the key to growing cricket globally.

Last week, Cricket USA chief executive Iain Higgins revealed a desire to co-host an ICC tournament with the West Indies from 2023-2031, stating that "If you played (the World T20) in the USA, every venue would be sold out. Other sports have used their major events as catalysts for growth in non-traditional markets. Imagine India playing Pakistan in a T20 World Cup in the US - you could not build a venue big enough.”

Higgins also mentioned that it’s USA Cricket’s “objective to have a team that’s competing with full members of the ICC in the short term” and “to become a full member of the ICC in the next 10 years”, as well as stressing the USA’s aim of achieving test status before 2030.

Some big goals, goals that some might view as unrealistic – but the early signs appear promising.

In April 2019, the USA gained One Day International (ODI) status after a number of stellar performances in the second division of the now defunct ICC World Cricket League and since then the American side have beaten a number of more established teams, including Scotland, the UAE and Namibia.

There is only one ICC certified venue in the States, Central Broward Park in Lauderhill, Florida, but the ground has played host to six ODIs,  ten T20Is and later this year two T20Is between the West Indies and South Africa are scheduled to be played there. Crowds at matches played in the Florida stadium have been described as being ‘healthy and supportive’ and Indian spin bowling legend Anil Kumble said he was “very impressed by the facilities” on offer. 

Plans have also been made to create a minimum of 6 new cricket stadiums capable of hosting international fixtures in the country.

This summer was set to be the start of Minor League cricket, an 8 week long nationwide domestic T20 competition in the USA played across 22 cities, but the Covid-19 pandemic could see it start at a different date than hoped.

Perhaps more excitingly, there is work underway to develop Major League Cricket (MLC), a professional cricket competition in the States, which will be the first of its kind. According to their website, “MLC aims to make cricket a leading sport in the USA through the creation of a world class national T20 tournament” and the competition will feature “top international players from the US and around the world”.

The league is exclusively sanctioned by USA Cricket and “is co-founded by the founders Willow TV, the largest cricket broadcaster in North America and the principals of The Times of India Group, India’s largest media conglomerate”, as stated by MLC. Alongside the competition, MLC plans to develop “high performance pathways to create a depth talent pool of players to feed Major and Minor League Cricket”.

It’s fair to say that cricket does appear to have huge potential in the States - but only time will tell whether the game we love takes off in a market it has never quite managed to unlock.