Why Doesn’t China Play Cricket ?

1. Importance of Olympics:

China is a country where people give a lot of emphasis on sports in the Olympics. As we are already aware cricket isn’t a part of the Olympics. Also the fact that cricket has a very less chance to feature in Olympics in future. Hence cricket isn’t popular sport in China. 

Although China has its national cricket team, China cricket team is not considered as a part of regular international cricket playing nation. 

As other sports in China gets much more attention than cricket, cricket in China isn’t popular like many other sports.

Chinese team and players have a very good track record in the Olympics. China usually ranks 2nd in the medals tally in Olympics.

The big reason behind the above fact is China invest a lot in other sports like Football, Table Tennis, Badminton etc. As a result apart from Basketball and Football Chinese players are considered best in sports like badminton and Table Tennis.

So in short, too much importance on sports of the Olympics is one of the biggest reason why China doesn’t play cricket.

2. British Rulers Impact:

Britishers have ruled in major of the world in the past. Countries like India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nepal were ruled by the British. So it’s quite obvious why cricket is popular sports in these nations as Cricket is originated from England. On the other hand, China was never colonised by British rulers while all the other cricket playing nations were ruled by Britishers for so long.

Britisher’s kings used to play and organise a lot of cricketing matches for entertainment & to follow their culture.

So that’s one of the biggest reason why countries like India, Pakistan, Australia plays cricket & China doesn’t play cricket as China never came under English Dominion.

One more factor which plays an important role is that China isn’t a former commonwealth country. 

3. Global Recognition:

Sports like football, tennis are recognised all over the Globe. But initially, only 22 nations used to play cricket. However, now there are around 100 nations which are connected with ICC (International Cricket Council). 

But as cricket is not recognised globally, making it popular in a huge country like China that too without any Cricketing culture is phenomenally difficult. Also, the fact that – to grow in a particular field or sports you need to have a role model in that field. Chinese kids lack role models as cricket is not popular sports in China.

Many countries don’t play cricket but there are teams like Germany, Italy & Argentina plays cricket but they are not noticeable.

China women’s team recently took part in the Women’s World T-20 qualifiers, and they played well to some extent. But the problem is that they didn’t play a noticeable level of cricket & hasn’t made their mark.

Cricket is slowly getting a place in sports in China. According to Wikipedia cricket is now played in nine cities in China, namely Beijing, Shanghai, Shenyang, Dalian, Guangzhou, Shenzhen, Chongqing, Tianjin and Jinan. More than 150 schools have been involved.

India-Pakistan matches are already very popular, now imagine what if China also comes to the cricket ground, it will become an interesting thing. However it doesn’t seem happening anytime soon, still we hope that we would see China playing cricket some day.