The International Cricket Council (ICC) is set to approve a continental qualification system to decide the six participating teams in the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics. Full Members such as Pakistan, New Zealand, and Sri Lanka, among others, could miss out on cricket’s much-anticipated return to the Olympics after over a century.

It is understood that the board discussed a proposal at the recent annual general meeting (AGM), which allows for one team from each continent. Though some details still need to be finalized, the majority approval for a regional qualification system is in place, with a minority of members expressing dissent.

Six teams in the men’s and women’s categories will contest for Olympic medals between July 14 and 29 in 2028 after the International Olympic Committee (IOC) allowed cricket to be added to the roster for the first time since the Paris 1900 Olympics. While the ICC’s initial thinking was that it would shortlist the top six-ranked teams at a pre-determined cut-off date, several Full Member countries believed such an approach wouldn’t allow for a wider representation of countries from across the globe.

That has now changed to a one-country-per-continent qualification system, which aligns more with the Olympic participation ethos.

Which countries are shortlisted will be based on the rankings on a set date. However, if the ICC plan goes through, the Olympics may not have one of the most widely watched contests in global sport: India vs Pakistan. Based on the current ICC T20 rankings, in both men’s and women’s competitions, India will qualify from Asia, Australia from Oceania, England from Europe, with one between the USA or one of the islands from the Caribbean from the Americas, while South Africa qualifies from Africa. ESPN-cricinfo understands that the ICC is still discussing the participation of the USA, which potentially gets direct entry as hosts.

But questions remain about the make-up of the USA men’s team, the majority of whom are US residents but not naturalised US citizens. The ICC is also concerned that the USA women’s team is not among the top 20-ranked teams at the moment. A final decision is likely to be made at the ICC’s next quarterly meeting in October.

The ECB, along with Cricket Scotland and Cricket Ireland, has formed Great Britain Cricket, which will facilitate the selection of players from England, Scotland, and Northern Ireland to represent Great Britain at the Games.

For the West Indies, CWI wrote to the ICC in May, pitching two ideas that could allow one of the regional countries to represent the Caribbean in the Olympics. One suggestion was an internal qualifying tournament conducted among the Caribbean countries, with the winner heading to the Olympics. The other involved conducting a global qualifying pathway that would pit countries in the five ICC development regions alongside regions in the West Indies.

For the sixth team, the ICC is considering a global qualifier, the structure of which is still being fine-tuned.

Speaking yesterday to BBC’s Test Match Special, ECB chairman Richard Thompson said that the IOC was keen on having a team from each continent, which satisfies the Olympic charter. “The preference from the IOC is to work to the ‘five ring’ principle, which is that teams from each continent represent their continent,” Thompson said.

The ICC is also optimistic about increasing the number of participating teams in the next two Olympics, in 2032 in Brisbane and 2036. The venue for these Olympics has yet to be finalised by the IOC. Thompson said that with India expected to bid hard to host the 2036 Summer Games, cricket could receive a massive boost.

“The hope is, when we get to Brisbane, we might be up to eight or ten teams, and in 2036, there’s a three-way shoot-out between Qatar, Saudi, and India, and clearly the real hope is that India gets in it in 2036, in which case, cricket will be front and centre. Who knows? It could be ten or 12 teams by that stage.

“At this stage, we are there by the invitation of the IOC and on that basis, you abide by their rules, and that is to play the geography of your game as opposed to necessarily the top six playing nations.”