The one and only cricket match played in the Olympic games was during the 1900 Paris Olympics between Great Britain and France. The match was played over two days and it was a low-scoring affair.
Incidentally, 24 players were fielded, 12 in each team, rather than 22 cricketers, and none of them had represented their national teams in the past. Great Britain was represented by the Devon and Somerset Wanderers club, France were represented by a team called All Paris. Two half-centuries and two five-wicket hauls were recorded in the historic match.
Meanwhile, the International Olympic Committee (IOC), which was formed in 1894, had earlier planned to include cricket in the Olympics during the 1896 Athens Games. However, their plan did not come to fruition as cricket was not able to generate a sufficient number of teams to participate.
Who won the Gold in cricket’s only participation in Olympic Games?
Four years later, cricket debuted in the Olympic Games in Paris. Initially, four teams – Great Britain, France, the Netherlands and Belgium – were supposed to participate in the event. However, later the Netherlands and Belgium pulled out from the event after their bids to co-host the Olympic Games did not materialise.
After a lot of hustle, the match finally took place between August 19 and 20 at the Velodrome de Vincennes, a cycling venue. Alfred Bowerman and Montagu Toller of Great Britain starred in the match with the bat and bowl respectively as they won the only cricket match played in the Olympic Games by 158 runs.
After the match, the Great Britain team were awarded a silver medal while France took the bronze medal home. However, 12 years later Britain and France’s medals were converted into gold and silver and the game was stamped as the official Summer Games event.
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