Former cricketers Shane Warne and Sachin Tendulkar "called for Twenty20 cricket to become an Olympic sport," according to Sam Sheringham of the BBC. Cricket has not featured since 1900 but the Int'l Cricket Council is meeting the IOC next month "to discuss a possible bid." Warne said, "I'd love to see it as an Olympic sport and, who knows, down the track it might be." Tendulkar said, "I think it's a great idea and I reckon T20 is the best format for it." Former Australia leg-spinner Warne and ex-Indian batsman Tendulkar "are captaining rival teams in a series of three Twenty20 All Star matches" in the U.S. in November as they seek to use their fame to help globalize the game. Their backing for an Olympic bid "will increase the pressure" on the ICC "to reverse its resistance to the concept on the grounds that it might dilute the sport's existing competitions, such as the World Cup and World Twenty20." Following its board meeting in October, the ICC announced that its CEO David Richardson and Dir Giles Clarke "would hold talks with the IOC in November." The ECB "had long opposed the idea because of the potential financial implications of an Olympic competition taking place at the height of the English summer" (BBC, 10/27). REUTERS' Simon Jennings wrote the Marylebone Cricket Club in July "urged the sport's ruling body" to try to get the game's Twenty20 int'l format into the Olympics. The MCC, founded in 1787 and the owner of the Lord's ground where it is based, "was formerly the governing body of world cricket and is the guardian of the laws of the game." Warne said that he was in favor of the Twenty20 format for the Olympics, but "is open to the idea of indoor cricket being chosen as well" (REUTERS, 10/27).
