Cricket in Indonesia: A promising future ahead

There are some promising signs for the development of cricket in Indonesia

Try searching “Cricket in Indonesia” on the internet and you are bound to get the Jakarta Cricket Association (JCA) as one of the top results. Set up in 1992, the JCA was the first formal cricket association in Indonesia. The game of cricket in the country of thousand islands has come a long way since then with the formation of Cricket Indonesia in 2000 and its induction as an affiliate member of the International Cricket Council (ICC) in 2001.

Role of JCA in Indonesian cricket

Today, Cricket Indonesia has three full members - the JCA, Cricket Bali and Cricket Bogor. However, people still regard the JCA as the premier cricket association in Indonesia. The JCA itself has come a long way since its inception. It currently has 3 grounds in different parts of the city and is home to 400 cricketers from across 10 nationalities.

The JCA League has 16 teams and is one of the biggest cricket leagues in Indonesia. It also has a T20 tournament which is played by 12 teams over a two-month period. It will not be wrong to say that Jakarta is to Indonesian cricket what Bombay (now Mumbai) with its various cricket clubs and leagues once was to Indian cricket.

The fact that cricketing greats like Sunil Gavaskar, Sir Vivian Richards, Sir Richard Hadlee, Sir Ian Botham and Kapil Dev have graced the JCA league’s annual gala dinner over the years has helped a lot in making the game popular in the country.

Locals slowly taking interest in cricket

While it is true that the game of cricket was brought to Indonesia by expats of cricket playing nations, the introduction of the game of cricket in Indonesia is credited to an Australian veterinarian surgeon who taught the game to his domestic staff so that his son does not miss the game while he is miles away from his homeland.

But the scene is changing now and the locals are also taking an avid interest in the game of cricket. They find cricket to be similar to Kasti, an Indonesian traditional sport which also involves the use of a wooden bat and a rubber ball.

In terms of popularity as a sport in Indonesia, football and badminton supersede cricket by a big margin and these events like the annual gala dinner where the locals actually get to meet legends of the game can go a long way in making the sport popular in the country.

The future

“Promoting the global game” is part of the mission statement of the ICC, hence it is also in the interest of the game that cricket becomes more popular in countries like Indonesia. And there are enough motivational stories of new entrants or so-called minnows performing well at the biggest stage of them all.

Let us not forget that India were not even considered to be on the cricketing map in One-Day Internationals (ODIs) until Kapil Dev’s outfit won the 1983 World Cup. Nor were the Sri Lankans considered a threat until they won the 1996 World Cup. To give a more recent example, Bangladesh upset the founders of the game, England, on their way to the quarter-finals of the 2015 World Cup.

As I write this piece, Bangladesh are 2-0 up in a 3-match ODI series against India, having also whitewashed Pakistan 3-0 in an ODI series just recently. Then there are teams like Afghanistan and Ireland, who are constantly knocking on the doors in a bid to get an entry as full-member nations.

So, with the efforts of associations like the JCA, along with the backing of Cricket Indonesia and the ICC, we might soon have a day when the Indian Archipelago will be playing cricket with the big boys. As they say, “Cricket is a game of glorious uncertainties”.