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One of India’s best cricket players of all time is moving to the United States.
Ravichandran Ashwin will join San Francisco Unicorns for the upcoming edition of Major League Cricket. Ashwin is the first former Indian national team player to play in the US league, set for 2023.
It is a remarkable moment for the sport in both countries, especially given that cricket will return for the 2028 Olympics in Los Angeles after a 128-year absence. The 39-year-old Ashwin recently performed in an exhibition in the Dallas-Fort Worth area, hinting that the move could be promising.
“Seeing the welcome given by Asian immigrants in that match showed me how much potential there can be in American cricket,” Ashwin told ESPN on Saturday. “It’s very exciting.”
Ashwin is one of the best players in the history of international cricket. This bowler is at eighth place in terms of taking Test wickets. He ranks second in Indian history in that category and helped the country win the 2011 World Cup, its first since its initial victory in 1983.
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Ashwin joins other notable international cricket stars such as former South Africa captain Faf du Plessis, former West Indies star Kieron Pollard and New Zealand’s Trent Boult who will play in the MLC for the US. Ashwin was initially scheduled to feature in Australia’s Big Bash League, but was ruled out due to a knee injury that required surgery.
“This will be the first time he will play in a major global franchise competition outside India,” MLC CEO Johnny Grave told ESPN. “And for us to be the first league to attract a player of this caliber is testament to how the league has evolved over the last three years.”
The six-team league will play its matches in Texas, Los Angeles and Oakland, including the final on July 18 at the Oakland Coliseum. This is the T20 version of the game, which is approximately three hours long and has become popular around the world.
According to the International Cricket Council, the recent semi-final match between India and England in the T20 World Cup was watched by 320 million viewers across both digital and streaming platforms. To put it in perspective, this year’s Super Bowl averaged 125.6 million viewers.
There is a growing appetite for cricket in the United States, which co-hosts the 2024 T20 World Cup. 34,028 fans gathered in Nassau County, New York following India’s win over Pakistan, the largest attendance at an American cricket match. Team USA also defeated Pakistan in a major upset that year.
Ashwin said other players with Indian background or playing for youth national teams, such as US captain Monank Patel and Harmeet Singh, have played in the MLC. Ashwin said the number of Americans enrolling at his cricket academy, both in person and virtually, is a sign of the growing interest in the game.
And this was a major reason for his decision to play.
“The fact that kids and a lot of people who have immigrated to America are showing so much interest in the game, I just wanted to come and experience what it will look like when we come to the MLC,” Ashwin said.
There is also increasing corporate interest in it from major American investors. According to ESPNcricinfo, an ownership group led by Kal Somani and includes denver broncos Owner Rob Walton successfully purchased Rajasthan Royals for $1.6 billion. According to the BBC, the Royals are one of the teams in the highly lucrative T20 league Indian Premier League, which sold its streaming and TV rights for a combined $6.02 billion in 2022. The deal comes ahead of cricket’s inclusion in the 2028 Olympics in Los Angeles, marking the first time the sport will be included in the Games since 1900.
“All these news stories over the last few years have meant that cricket is becoming more familiar to Americans,” Graves said. “And certainly when we talk to trading partners, leaders, countries, cities, people have at least heard of cricket now. It’s certainly not an unknown sport here.”
One reason Ashwin has been able to compete in the MLC is his retirement from not only international cricket but the IPL, where he played from 2009 to 2025. He said his involvement comes at a very important time for the sport.
Historically, the Test format, which can be played over five days, has been the ultimate version of the game. But the shorter T20 format, similar to a baseball game with 120 pitches per team, has helped the game grow with several international leagues.
Ashwin said he believed the days of countries playing each other over several weeks in multiple versions of the game were “going to be incredibly tough.” And with the Olympics in two years, one of the world’s biggest sports could be poised for even greater growth.
He said, “We stand at a critical point for sport where this particular sport is struggling and fighting to be free in terms of globalizing it.” “So I think over the next decade there will be a lot more freedom in terms of how many people want to be involved and how many people want to be involved.”
