JUSTIN LANGER: Pat Cummins led-Australia will be vying for Olympic gold in Los Angeles against India

Now that all is said and done and our Australian Olympians have returned home from an incredibly successful and spectacularly entertaining Paris Olympics, sights will quickly be set towards the Los Angeles Games in four years’ time.

Before then, it would be remiss not to applaud all our Australian team members for their success and graciousness in victory as well as in defeat. Representing your country is a privilege reserved for a precious few, and this Olympics highlighted the enormous pride our nation takes in our sporting endeavours.

Anna Meares was superb in how she represented us as Chef de Mission. An incredible competitor as an athlete, her articulate communication and empathetic leadership were a highlight of Australia’s Games.

Watching her and how our athletes held themselves in triumph and devastation was a joy. Lumps in the throat and goosebumps were consistent reactions over the last few weeks; these physiological responses only result from emotions conjured from special moments. These Olympics have provided us with many examples.

Paris featured non-traditional sports like skateboarding, sport climbing, surfing, and break dancing. All of them offered some of the fondest and most talked-about moments from the Games.

Five new Olympic sports will debut at the Los Angeles Games in 2028. Flag football, lacrosse, squash, baseball/softball, and cricket.

Cricket will be the most fascinating inclusion for me, as it is the game that takes up the longest length of time and requires natural facilities and turf pitches.

The recent T20 World Cup held in the emerging cricketing nation of the USA was hampered by poor standards of pitches that hindered the standard of the games.

The hope in cricket circles is that the newly formed US T20 league will continue to develop over the next four years, setting the Olympic campaign up for success through maturing systems and processes.

If the ICC wants the Olympics to broaden cricket’s globalisation, deciding which nations qualify for the competition will be critical. At this point, the qualification process hasn’t been set, but with the length of the T20 game, having only 8-10 teams could make the fortnight-long schedule work.

In comparison, the recent T20 World Cup hosted 20 teams and ran for a month. There will be several disappointed nations if the qualifying isn’t deemed fair over the next four years.

India didn’t win a gold medal in the Paris Olympics. As the current powerhouse of the cricket world, India would be desperate to use cricket as an opportunity to remedy themselves in 2028.

Equally, their arch-rival Pakistan won a single gold medal at these Games. They would see cricket as a way to add to their Olympic success.

Surprisingly, sports-mad South Africa only won a combined tally of six medals, including a single gold, while Australia and New Zealand punched above their per capita weight with 18 and 10 gold medals respectively.

You would imagine the USA would have to have a team as the host nation, but that would be at the expense of one of the more established cricket nations.

As the leading country with 126 medals in Paris, it would be hard to see them adding an Olympic medal in cricket, but their involvement will be a part of the push to continue the game’s development in their country, and around the globe.

Cricket in the Olympics is a significant focus within the walls of cricket’s leaders, but they will have to think long and hard about how it will achieve the maximum effect through the biggest sporting stage of them all.