What could be India's men's playing 11 for the 2028 Olympics ft. Rishabh Pant and Shubman Gill

A landmark decision by the International Olympic Committee (IOC) has seen the approval of cricket as part of the 2028 Olympics in Los Angeles.

Six teams are set to take part in the games in the T20 format, with both the men's and women's sides featuring. The buzz has been palpable ever since the committee announced its decision in Mumbai on Monday, October 16.

The event is less than five years away and that's a long period of time. After all, turn back the clock by five years - the writer was not even an undergraduate and like most others on the planet, hadn't heard of the term 'pandemic' (and gladly so, as he will tell you).

Yet, curiosity doesn't evade the mind and you cannot put it past fans and experts to visualize a potential playing XI when India takes the field for the 2028 Olympics notwithstanding the possibility of a number of changes in the time leading into it.

We're exercising this curiosity ourselves here - partly for fun and partly to assess how much of this ought to come true a few years down the line. Of course, there's an U19 World Cup scheduled for 2024 and it could well throw up the next Shubman Gill or Virat Kohli who could become the team's mainstay in 2028.

That's for later though - at this point, taking inspiration from 7Cricket's own attempt with the Australian women's team, we try picturing a possible playing XI for the Indian men's team for the 2028 Olympics.

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Openers: Shubman Gill and Yashasvi Jaiswal

This is an opening combination that is touted to dominate international cricket across formats for many, many years. And by the time the 2028 Olympics come by, you'd think both Shubman Gill and Yashasvi Jaiswal will be on the ascent towards their peak.

Given how they've begun already in their international careers, it sounds scary doesn't it? When they embark upon the mega event, Gill will be 28 and Jaiswal, 26, with the possibility of a host of batting records against their names already.

Where does that leave India's gold medal-winning captain at the Asian Games though? Ruturaj Gaikwad could very well be a part of the Olympics too but it's hard to see the Gill-Jaiswal combination being dislodged.

Call it the new Tendulkar-Ganguly or the new Rohit-Dhawan, but they could set a standard of their own for generations to come.

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Middle order: Tilak Varma, Yash Dhull, Rishabh Pant (c&wk), Rinku Singh, and Nishant Sindhu

Tilak Varma will be a mainstay in the Indian team for years to come and there are no two ways about it for the skill he possesses. India's U19 World Cup-winning captain in 2022, Yash Dhull, has been a serial run-scorer in domestic cricket and while he hasn't cracked the IPL code just yet, you've got to say it's just a matter of time.

Dhull could certainly make his India debut in the years to come as a middle-overs spin-basher while fellow Delhiite Rishabh Pant perhaps being the captain. After all, Pant has established himself as a young superstar already and India's fond history with wicket-keeper captains might well extend into the 2028 Olympics.

This leaves us with the frontline finisher - there's only one name that springs to mind with Rinku Singh carrying forward his run of form in the IPL into international cricket too. And what's cricket at the Olympics without Rinku producing a Houdini act, eh? The perfect advertisement for the rest of the world to sit up and take note!

Haryana's Nishant Sindhu, who scored a solid half-century in the final of the U19 World Cup last year, is another prodigy who is expected to be an India mainstay for a long time. While he is Ravindra Jadeja's understudy at the Chennai Super Kings (CSK) at this point, the baton could well be his own in time to come.

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Bowlers: Harshit Rana, Jasprit Bumrah, Kuldeep Yadav, and Umran Malik

Harshit Rana was one of India's stars at the Emerging Asia Cup in Sri Lanka this year. Hard lengths at quick pace define the tall Delhi speedster who represents the Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) in the IPL and he can also wield the willow long.

Talk about fascinating first-time cricket viewers at the 2028 Olympics and you've got to reiterate that famous subcontinental adage - pace is pace yaar!

Umran Malik has to be there. And he will be if developed and groomed well. Oh the thought of the Jammu Express steaming in and firing thunderbolts at one end and Jasprit Bumrah's guile and mastery at the other - the stuff of box office, isn't it?

Of course, India would do well to manage Bumrah's workload and perhaps rest him from all T20I endeavors save for the 2028 Olympics and the World Cup.

This leaves us with our frontline spinner - Kuldeep Yadav is on his way to becoming a white-ball legend. He's not far away from securing a legacy in ODIs and the way he's going about his work in T20Is, we could be looking at the world's best spinner at the time once he boards the plane to Los Angeles.

Exciting team, isn't it? Gold at the 2028 Olympics, you think? No harm in dreaming if you're an Indian fan.

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India's predicted playing XI for the 2028 Olympics: Shubman Gill, Yashasvi Jaiswal, Tilak Varma, Yash Dhull, Rishabh Pant (c & wk), Rinku Singh, Nishant Sindhu, Harshit Rana, Jasprit Bumrah, Kuldeep Yadav and Umran Malik.

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Want to try this exercise out yourself? Have your say as to who should make it to India's squad for the 2028 Olympics in the comments section below!