Cricket is a sport that can be played by players with physical, learning, or sensory disabilities. Deaf cricket is one such format which is played between teams comprising of players who have a hearing loss of 55 decibels in their stronger ear. A level field is ensured by not allowing any player to wear a hearing aid or cochlear implants.
Deafness or hearing impairment does not majorly affect the game play of cricket. Thus, all rules of this format of the sport follow the ones that are laid out by the Marylebone Cricket Club. There are however certain communication barriers between players that they need to be vary of. For example, during the coin toss, the captain can indicate his head to denote heads. All fielders communicate with each other via sign language. There is a sign for every field position and hand waves are used for drawing the attention of a player. The biggest challenge for bowlers is when they are unsure if the ball has edged the bat in cases of a caught behind dismissal. However, in any doubt, they can appeal to the umpire to clear their doubt.
South Australia and Victoria contested the first match between hard of hearing cricketers in 1895. It took almost a century for an international match between deaf cricketers to be played. This was a test match between England and Australia wherein the latter emerged the winners.
Globally, cricket for the deaf or hard of hearing is managed by the Deaf International Cricket Council (DICC). India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Nepal, Australia, England, Trinidad amd Tobago, and South Africa have the most active deaf cricket associations. However, regional circuits for deaf cricket are structured and more organized in Australia and England. Moreover, Australia, England, and India also have domestic events for female deaf cricketers.
The first two editions of the Deaf Cricket World Cup played in the One Day International format were held in 1995 and 2005. Australia and India won those events, and in each event England finished as the runner-up. In 2016, a Deaf International Cricket Council Championship was held wherein the English were yet again the runner-ups.Deaf cricket has also seen four T20 World Cups as of 2025. The first two editions were won by India and the next two were won by Pakistan and Sri Lanka. A Champions Trophy was also held in 2022 which was played between India, South Africa, Australia, and Bangladesh. This was won by India and the tournament was played in the T20 format.
The teams that are a part of the Deaf International Cricket Council are Afghanistan, Australia, Bangladesh, England, India, Nepal, New Zealand, Pakistan, South Africa, Trinidad and Tobago, USA and Zimbabwe. Tri-series and bilateral series between leading nations continue to be held to keep this format in the limelight.
