The International Cricket Council (ICC) was last month given full recognition by the International Olympic Committee's (IOC) ruling Executive Board, which means it is now eligible to become part of the Games.

Twenty20, a faced paced format of the game introduced in England in 2003, has proved immensely popular across the world with the Indian Premier League (IPL),  a competition set up in 2008 featuring the sport's best players,proving one of the biggest, most financially lucrative sporting events in the world.

But despite the success of the sport leading to calls from top players, such as Australian Adam Gilchrist, to ask for it to be introduced to the Olympic programme for the 2020 Games, the ICC have presently ruled out such a move.

During a lecture at Lords last year Gilchrist had said that Olympic status would help develop cricket internationally and he said he could not imagine "a better or more effective way to spread the game throughout the world".

He is supported by several other top players, included Ricky Ponting, Graeme Smith and Sourav Ganguly, the captains of Australia, South Africa and India respectively.

But cricket's world governing has set to resist the growing campaign for cricket to try to join rugby sevens and golf on the Olympic programme, sports that added by the IOC for the 2016 Games in Rio.

An ICC statement to insidethegames said: "Cricket [first] became a recognised sport within the Olympic Movement in 2007 and we are very pleased that the ICC holds such a globally recognisable status. 

"We are delighted to be involved in the IOC and it brings significant benefits for many of our members. 

"However, at this stage, there are no plans to apply for cricket’s return to the programme of events."

Cricket was part of the 1900 Olympics in Paris, when a team from Devon and Somerset Wanderers, representing Britain, beat the French Athletic Club Union in a 12-a-side, one-day, two innings-a-team match.

With the match billed as part of the 1900 Universal Exposition, neither side appears to have realised they were competing in the Olympics.

The match was only retrospectively formally recognised as being an Olympic contest in 1912, when the IOC met to compile the definitive list of all events in the five modern Olympiads up to that point.

It has never appeared in the Games since but is due to be part of the programme at this year's Asian Games in Guangzhou, China, and has featured in the Commonwealth Games as recently as 1998.

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