View From Asia: “Outtakes from the T20 Cricket World Cup”

In his latest View From Asia column, Unmish Parthasarathi, the Singapore-based Founder of Picture Board Partners, Monetisation & Communications practice, shares insights from the recently concluded ICC T20 World Cup.

This last weekend marked the halfway mark of the first FIFA World Cup played in the USA three decades ago, in 1994. Saturday also saw the final match of a Cricket World Cup that was played in the Caribbean but will be remembered as the culmination of the first ICC tournament to also be played in the United States. 

For the record, the first official cricket match between two countries was also played in the USA – in 1844! Back then, the home side beat Canada at the St. George’s Cricket Club, a venue that is located at 30th and Broadway for those more familiar with modern day Manhattan! 

Last Saturday’s final featured India and South Africa – the only two undefeated teams in the tournament – with the former winning a nail biter that ended past 2am for me and the family here in Singapore! 

The 2024 ICC Men’s Twenty20 (T20) World Cup was a three week tournament involving 20 teams, and featuring 55 matches played across six countries in the Caribbean and three US cities; Dallas (Texas), Lauderhill (Florida) and Long Island (New York). 

Matches at the Nassau County Stadium in Long Island over indexed on attention for two reasons amongst many. The first was for the reported $30 Million spent by the ICC to create a pop-up stadiums that would seat 30,000. This may be seemingly small but is larger than any ground in the UK and the six games at this venue generated an attendance of more than 180,000!!!  

The second reason was that one of the six games at Nassau County Stadium hosted the match between India and Pakistan. This fixture has routinely attracted over a billion eyeballs around the world for more than a decade. 

However, the more prominent and hence far bigger and more longer lasting gains were had by the frequent mentions about the ICC tournament in mainstream American media. Stories on CNBC and a front page article in The New York Times were the most notable for those with an international lens. There was regional press coverage too, which is as potent as nationwide media outlets given what is a large and diverse country. It also aligns better with the pockets of demand for Cricket; more on that below. 

Whilst researching for this column, I polled a handful of industry peers about their assessment of the ICC’s first ever event in the United States. All were complimentary. Some noted that the fact that it all went to plan and was normal is in itself the major achievement. One made a telling comment about the $30 Mn spend. She said we must look at this as an investment of a million dollar a year recovered over the next three decades. She illustrated her point by citing how much Football (or Soccer!) has grown, over the same time period, in the United Stares since hosting the FIFA World Cup, in the early 1990s. 

1. Back then, the largest, and the most loyal, fan segment who played Football/Soccer were the first generation immigrants from Latin America, who were largely male. 

2. The following decade saw women take to Football, a far larger demographic segment who took the sport mainstream as typified by the now well-known phenomenon of the ‘Soccer Moms’. 

3. The third decade has been notable for David Beckham’s move to LA Galaxy, Major League Soccer’s global deal with Apple and the exporting of players into Europe like Brad Friedel, who made 450 appearances in goal across four English Premier League clubs. 

Looking ahead, a few other reasons make the future of Cricket in America appear on a sound footing. 

First, their team, having got automatic entry into the tournament as the co-hosts, did extremely well in their first senior event. They beat the 1992 winners, Pakistan, in an epic encounter that will go down as a significant milestone in the annals of its history. 

Secondly, the team is young, averaging 30 so the same batch of players will participate at the next edition in two years when India host the Twenty20 World Cup. The squad is a melting pot typical of the US; coached by a former Australian international, with players who have emigrated from the Caribbean, India, Pakistan, South Africa and New Zealand. 

Third, the installed base of over 200,000 active players. This represents a 4x to 30x multiple of the next three most resurgent cricket countries in the First World: Ireland (52,000) Scotland (24,000), and the Netherlands (6,500). Uncle Sam hosts the largest cricket clusters in Texas, California, Florida and New York with smaller pockets in North Carolina and Colorado.

Fourth, the existence of a domestic league, called MLC (Major League Cricket). This is the pathway pinnacle for young players to aim for from the grassroots with franchises in the south, east and west of the country. Not surprisingly the owners of MLC clubs are Indian immigrants who made good by their financial and technical know how and possess the means to scale the MLC, and potentially faster than the MLS.  

Fifth, the USA and the Women’s Game are agenda items for the ICC, being two of the six pillars of their publicly stated strategy for this decade. This will ensure that the USA stands to gain from programs for the next batch of emerging nations (the Associate Members in ICC nomenclature) that has met with a lot of success in smaller Third World countries such as Afghanistan, Nepal, Papua New Guinea and, most recently, Uganda and Thailand. 

In conclusion, we know that one swallow doesn’t make a summer. However, given the many achievements witnessed during this summer – both on and off the pitch – the future of Cricket in Uncle Sam’s back yard looks more promising than ever before. As ever, Cricket is best played one ball at a time. This is understood by those who play the long game, and is easier said than done for those who don’t! Howzat?