Five associate nations with potential to reach greater heights

For way too long, cricket has been a closed shop in regards to the number of countries in the world participating at the very top level. Despite cricket’s very long history, the fact that there are just 10 ICC full member nations currently reflects poorly on the game’s global appeal in my opinion.However, pushing associate nations into Test cricket would be foolhardy and result in the standard of Test cricket being diluted, with them not having anywhere near enough quality to compete. What wouldn’t be a bad idea, though, is to encourage some of the top cricketing nations to play ODIs against these associates at reasonably frequent intervals. If associates can get that exposure of playing against the top teams, they can definitely aim to become competitive on a consistent basis in the shorter formats of the game within the next few years.       Here are five associate nations with burgeoning potential-

#5 China

The Chinese Cricket Association has set itself far-fetched goals like qualifying for the 2019 Cricket World Cup in England and achieving Test status in 2020. While achieving these targets is virtually impossible as far as Im concerned, the fact that they do have such lofty ambitions does indicate that they are at least viewing the sport seriously.

The China national team has participated in cricket at the Asian Games during the last 2 editions, and for the time being, that could be a good way to promote the sport and create interest for the game amongst the Chinese public. And in the distant future, who knows, we might even see China start giving healthy competition to much superior teamsin the shorter formats. All I can say is that if it does pan out that way, it will do nothing but tremendous good to the game of cricket.