An evening in Paris - When Cricket made its entry in Olympics

Cricket & Olympics are two words which are not taken together often. So, there was no surprise when the 119-member Indian Olympics contingent to Rio 2016 did not have a cricketer. But for a cricket-obsessed nation as ours, deep inside we Indians have been hoping for cricket to be included as an Olympics sport.

And that’s precisely the reason we were elated at the news of Sachin Tendulkar meeting the IOC chief Thomas Bach. Now, we don’t know if the Little Master made a pitch for the inclusion of cricket as an Olympic sport. But there have been reports of cricket being discussed for inclusion in the 2024 Olympics.

In fact, Simone Gambino, president of the Federazione Cricket Italiana (FCI) has gone on to say, “If Rome hosts the Olympics, cricket will be included”.

There have also been some rumors of a meeting being planned for later this year between Thomas Bach, ICC chairman Shashank Manohar and BCCI president Anurag Thakur. But as things stand at present, the relationship between cricket & Olympics can at best be termed as complicated.

We will have to wait and see if the meeting between the big bosses of cricket & IOC actually takes place and if cricket makes a re-entry into Olympics.

Yes, you read that right – re-entry of cricket into Olympics. Not many would know that cricket has been played in Olympics once before. So, till the time Olympic cricket becomes a reality in 2024 (or later), here’s an account of the only cricket match played for our cricket fans.

Withdrawn from 1896 Athens Olympics due to insufficient entries

Though the initial proposal was to include cricket as a sport in the 1896 Athens Olympics, it did not go through due to insufficient entries. So, it was the 1900 Paris Olympics which witnessed the first and the only cricket match played in the history of Olympics so far.

It was an unusual Olympics which lasted for more than five months and also had many first time sports like motorcycling, ballooning and cricket among others.

Two teams competed for the Olympic event

Cricket featured in the 2012 London Olympics Opening Ceremony

Even the 1900 Paris Olympics did not receive a sea of entries for cricket. After the withdrawal of the teams from Netherland and Belgium, only two teams played in the cricket tournament. And on August 19^th & 20^th, the match was played between Great Britain & hosts France at the Municipal Velodrome of Vincennes.

The ground was anything but a cricket stadium where a banked cycling track formed an unusual boundary for the cricket pitch. Interestingly, neither teams knew that they were competing in the Olympics as the match was advertised as being part of the world’s fair in Paris.

The Devon and Somerset Wanderers club constituted the British team whereas the French side comprised members from the French Athletic Club Union (which mainly had British expatriates living in Paris). The match was originally planned to be played with 11 players from each team, but a last minute agreement between the two captains – CBK Beachcroft of Great Britain & PH Tomalin of France turned this into a 12-a-side contest.

The result of this extra player in both the teams was that the 12^th name was hand written on the scorecard.

The Englishmen batted first and could manage only 117 runs in their first innings with FW Cuming being the top-scorer with 38 runs. Skipper Beachcroft was the next best scorer with 23 runs under his belt. In response, the French side was bundled for 78 runs with the top score coming from number 12 player J Braid. Britain’s FW Christian, with seven wickets was the chief destructor of the French innings.

Aided by half-centuries from Beachcroft & AJ Bowerman, the British side notched up 145 runs for the loss of 5 wickets in the second innings before declaring. Chasing a target of 185 runs, the French side collapsed completely in the second innings. They lost 10 wickets for only 11 runs and then decided to play for a draw.

But with only five minutes to go before the close of play, the last French wicket fell at the score of 26 runs. None of the French batsmen were able to reach double-digit score. MH Toller was the lead wicket taker in the second innings with a haul of seven wickets.

Winners were given silver medals

Members of the French senior and junior cricket team and officials pose, exactly 100 years to the day England beat France in the 1900 Paris Olympics at cricket 20 August 2000, prior to the start of a match against on old England XI at Hastings

After the match, the English side were awarded silver medals and the French side were given bronze medals. The reason behind this was that the match was not recognized then as being an Olympic contest. It was only in 1912 that the match was formally recognized as an Olympic contest and the medals were reassigned as gold & silver.

The record of the match itself would have been lost in history had it not been for John Symes. Symes, a member of the victorious British side had kept a score in his writing and thus played his part in passing the history to the next generation of cricket lovers.

And in 1990, England retains the Olympic title

In Cricket, we usually celebrate a century and a score of 90 does not get the same treatment. However, for this match, it was decided to celebrate the 90^th anniversary. So, in 1990, the Standard Athletic Club invited the Old Blundellians Cricket Club (the club which had four players in the original British side of 1900) to Paris.

The anniversary match ended in a draw and at the post-match dinner it was claimed that “England had retained the Olympic title!”. So, if not the 50-over World Cup champions; the Britishers can at least claim to be Olympic gold medalists in cricket.