ICC’s decision to grant ODI status to four teams augurs well for the sport’s globalisation

However, as bluntly as they scream from the roof-top, the sport has always been a domain of archaic oligarchy and has never been designed in a way to make it a global sport. In no small measure, the India-Australia dominance has made international cricket a stagnant pool since the turn of the millennium - noo matter whether the big three-model was in place or not. World Cup’s contraction to 10 teams or taking a measure share form the associate nation’s pocket were well steps to centralize cricket’s power in few countries, which directly affected the sport’s governing body’s ambition of making it a global game. 

But in cricket, due to ICC's love for elites and the attempt to make the sport a basis of meritocracy, the associates suffer the most and ICC’s one stupid step after another have devoid the cricket world from some glorious tales. Remember Ireland knocking out Pakistan in 2007 World Cup? You better do. And that is exactly the reason why ICC’s decision to give a total of 104 countries’ T20I matches international status and the expansion of ICC ODI ranking table came as a breath of fresh air.

Consider this for a moment. The world's arguably best spinner in T20s at the moment, Rashid Khan belongs to Afghanistan, a country that just received its Test status and the likes of Sandeep Lamichhane and Mujeeb ur Rahman created ripples in the recently-concluded Indian Premier League and who will say that they don't deserve to play more and more quality matches. Sports fans, since eternity, have been a sucker for minnow tales and the expansion will bring out stories of years of hard work and toil, of gaiety and aspirations.  

And on that count, while the ICC's recent step was a way forward, this also needs to be backed up by some truly important things like the movement to include cricket in the Olympic Games in the future. For example, let’s take a look at golf for example. After rugby rejoined the Games last year, the sport is now on the curriculum in Brazil, China, and the USA, and national Olympic federations spent over $30 million in preparation for the Games and this is a microcosm of how the Olympics can help cricket's expansionism.