In a basement office in the north of Rome, Riccardo Maggio is unpacking boxes of blue jerseys with “Italia” written on them. He sighs when the landline phone rings again, and then again. Maggio is on his own, multitasking in the headquarters of the Italian Cricket Federation, tucked away in the building that houses the Italian Olympic Committee (Coni), the governing body for national sports.
The room is small and improvised, its shelves cluttered with old trophies, faded photographs of players and souvenir cricket bats. The base for Italian cricket is hardly the nucleus of a global sporting moment. Yet, in a story that has largely flown under the radar in Italy, for the first time in their history the men’s national cricket team have qualified for the T20 World Cup, co-hosted by Sri Lanka and India, which begins this weekend.
