The schedule for the cricket competition of both the men’s and women’s teams of the Asian Games 2026 in Aichi-Nagoya in Japan has officially been revealed. Scheduled to be played at the Korogi Athletic Park in the Aichi prefecture, the tournament will feature the continent’s top nations competing with full international T20 status. This marks cricket’s fourth appearance at the Asian Games, following its inclusion in Guangzhou (2010), Incheon (2014), and Hangzhou (2023). All eyes will be on both the Indian men’s and women’s teams, who are the reigning gold medalists and will be looking to defend their crown.
The action will commence with the women’s competition, which runs from September 17 to September 22. Seeded directly into an eight-team knockout bracket, the defending champions India will begin their campaign against host nation Japan in the quarter-finals. The winner of this clash will advance to face either Bangladesh or China in the semi-finals. Rounding out the women’s quarter-final draw are Sri Lanka taking on Malaysia, and Pakistan facing Thailand.
The men’s tournament will follow, taking place from September 24 to October 1. The region’s traditional heavyweights, India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, and Bangladesh, have been granted top-seed status, allowing them to bypass the preliminary rounds and enter directly into the quarter-finals.
The four remaining knockout spots of the Asian Games 2026 will be contested in a preliminary round featuring six teams. Group A consists of Afghanistan, Japan, and Nepal, while Group B includes Hong Kong China, Malaysia, and Oman. The top two teams from each group will advance to challenge the seeded nations.
Due to the current draw, a highly anticipated men’s matchup between arch-rivals India and Pakistan can only materialize deep into the tournament, either in a blockbuster semi-final or the gold-medal match.
India’s Asian Games Squads
Men’s Team: Shreyas Iyer, Tilak Varma, Ravi Bishnoi, Abhishek Sharma, Nitish Kumar Reddy, Jasprit Bumrah, Sanju Samson, Axar Patel, Harshit Rana, Ishan Kishan, Washington Sundar, Arshdeep Singh, Shivam Dube, Varun Chakravarthy, Vaibhav Sooryavanshi.
Women’s Team: Harmanpreet Kaur (Captain), Smriti Mandhana (Vice-Captain), Shafali Verma, Jemimah Rodrigues, Deepti Sharma, Richa Ghosh (WK), G. Kamalini (WK), Bharti Fulmali, Sree Charani, Renuka Thakur, Kranti Gaud, Arundhati Reddy, Shreyanka Patil*, Radha Yadav, Nandni Sharma.
