The 2028 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles, California are expected to draw plenty of interest. Many familiar sports will be returning to the event, but there are also new sports expected to be involved as well. Two such sports, cricket and flag football, are especially interesting.
It will be intriguing to see how many NFL players participate in the flag football event. American football is a sport primarily played within the USA, but it is also a growing sport. The USA will be favored in flag football, but the Americans could receive some legitimate competition.
Meanwhile, cricket isn't too popular in the USA. It is a beloved sport in different countries around the world, however.
Today, we are going to break down the popularity of both cricket and flag football to determine which countries will be the top contenders for both sports in the 2028 Olympics.
Flag Football in the USA
Flag football is already a trending topic in the USA. Every professional/college football player who isn't in the NFL would love to play the sport in the Olympics. However, some NFL players will likely opt to play.
The threat of injuries will cause some to sit out though.
According to Google Trends, flag football has always been fairly popular in the USA. Sure, it's trending now since it was recently announced as an olympic sport. But the search demand on Google was just as high for flag football in February of 2023 as it is now. This, of course, was because the NFL Pro Bowl featured a flag football game.
The inclusion of flag football in the NFL event has already led the sport to increase in popularity.
So we have established that the USA is interested in flag football, but what about other countries?
Flag Football Worldwide
The Google search demand over the past few weeks for flag football worldwide has seen a significant spike due to the Olympics announcement. The same cannot be said for the year overall.
February's NFL Pro Bowl led to a slight increase in search demand for the sport. Overall, though, with google trends' 0-100 scale, the search demand for flag football worldwide sat between 20-40 for the most part.
That said, there are obviously a lot of countries around the world. So what countries are more interested in the sport than others?
Flag football is reportedly played in over 100 countries, per nflflag.com. The featured countries on the website include: Australia, New Zealand, Canada, China, Germany, and the United Kingdom. The countries' interest in the sport was summarized by Google Trends search data.
Prior to October, which is when the Olympics announcement was made, Australia reached a high of 22 on Google Trends' 0-100 scale for flag football web searches over the past 12 months. New Zealand, however, reached a high of 39 before October.
The United Kingdom didn't fare much better according to the analytics, recording a high of 16 over the past 12 months on the scale.
The USA will take notice of China and Canada's flag football search data though.
China's search data for flag football was inconsistent. In some months, the country posted a zero on the scale. However, China's highest mark checked in at 79, which came during the week of March 12-18 in 2023. China also saw a spike in November and December of 2022, as well as late January/early February and July.
Canada was extremely consistent in its flag football search demand. The country reached a high of 100 in January of 2023. It also never fell below 10 on the scale.
Another country that posted consistent results was Mexico. Mexico hasn't fallen below 22 on the scale over the last year and even reached a high of 100 in February.
There are certainly other countries that are getting more into flag football as well. It will be intriguing to see which teams end up standing out aside from the USA in the 2028 Olympics.
Analyzing Cricket
Cricket is not especially popular in the USA. There is still a decent amount of interest though. Again, prior to October, the USA reached a high of 61 on Google Trends' 0-100 scale for cricket searches.
The USA will face a challenge in trying to win a gold medal in cricket during the 2028 Olympics, however.
Cricket is a popular sport in countries such as: India, the United Kingdom, Australia, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, and Australia. There are a number of other countries that play and follow cricket as well.
India's highest cricket search mark was 70 on the Google Trends scale before October. Sri Lanka reached 100 in October of 2022, but remained below 50 from November of 2022-August of 2023. The country did reach 82 in September, however.
The United Kingdom reached 100 in July. Australia also reached a 100 back in December of 2022.
In the Cricket World Cup, India currently leads with a 5-0 record. New Zealand is second at 4-1. South Africa, Australia, and Pakistan all closely trail.
The USA likely won't be favored in cricket during the 2028 Olympics. The sport projects to produce very competitive results.
Flag Football and Cricket in the 2028 Summer Olympics
Cricket's inclusion in the 2028 Olympics will give the entire world the opportunity to see the sport in an exciting manner. It's a growing sport without question, and it will lead to increased interest in the USA.
Regardless of which country wins, this is a major victory for cricket.
The same can be said for flag football. Every American understands just how popular the NFL is. Flag football is a sport that is growing as well.
2028 is obviously a long ways away, but the anticipation of the Olympics will lead to more fans of flag football. Countries from all over the world that plan to compete in the Olympics will try to build and develop a competitive team.
Both flag football and cricket will benefit tremendously -- as they already are -- from being included in the 2028 Summer Olympics.
