The 23rd edition of the Commonwealth Games is all set to start in two days, but the excitement and the fervour around the multi-sport event have drastically reduced. In an age and era where sports bodies are pushing for more and more sports to be included in the CWG, Asian Games, Olympics and the like, CWG 2026 in Glasgow will see only 10 sports being played.
Scotland will only be the second country to host two editions of the Commonwealth Games within a span of 12 years, with Australia having earlier hosted the 2006 edition in Melbourne and 2018 in Gold Coast. But Glasgow is the only city in history to host it twice within that span.
Australia were set to host the 23rd edition of the event as well, with Victoria having successfully bid to welcome
the Commonwealth nations for the big-ticket tournament. Having won the bid in August 2022, the state had begun preparing for the event, only to pull out 11 months later.
How many sports were to be played in Victoria?
After much deliberation and discussion, a whopping 21 sports were decided to be played at the Victoria CWG, matching the record set by the tournament in India in 2010, when the same number of sports were played.
But on July 18, 2023, the Victoria state government announced its decision to withdraw from hosting the CWG, just 15 months after agreeing to stage the event. Premier Daniel Andrews said that the projected cost had ballooned to an estimated AUD 6-7 billion, far outweighing the expected benefits, making the expenditure impossible to justify.
The government also confirmed it would terminate its host agreement with the CWG Federation and negotiate a settlement over the contract.
How Glasgow Stepped In to Save the 2026 CWG
On April 11, 2024, Glasgow emerged as a ‘last-resort option’ to host the 2026 CWG if no other bidder came forward, in an effort to save the event. The proposed edition would be scaled down, with existing venues from the 2014 CWG reused and athletes accommodated through a combination of hotels and student housing facilities at Glasgow Caledonian University and the University of Glasgow.
By August 11, 2024, reports suggested that Glasgow had reached an agreement to take over the hosting rights for the 2026 CWG. The scaled-down and low-cost CWG will now feature just 10 sports taking place over seven venues and no athletes’ village.
Given the urgency and the lack of time to organise the event, this will be the lowest number of sports played at the CWG since 1994. The 1994 CWG in Victoria, Canada, featured just 10 sports as the programme was restricted to traditional individual events.
Team sports weren’t included at the time and were only introduced in the next edition, with the 1998 CWG in Kuala Lumpur marking their debut.
Which sports have been dropped for the 2026 CWG?
Multiple sports and disciplines featured in the previous edition have been removed from the programme, including badminton, beach volleyball, T20 cricket, diving, hockey, mountain biking, rhythmic gymnastics, road cycling, rugby sevens, squash, table tennis and para table tennis, triathlon and para triathlon, and wrestling.
Among the traditional full-team sports, only netball remains, while the shorter 3×3 format of basketball has been retained.
Some outdoor public events in retained sports, including athletics events such as marathons and race walking, as well as mountain biking and road cycling, have also been removed because of cost concerns.
Meanwhile, the bowls competition will be held in an indoor format rather than the traditional lawn bowls format.
