Ashwin, who retired from international cricket in December 2024 and then from the IPL at the end of the 2025 season after a lukewarm return to Chennai Super Kings, recently played an exhibition match in the Dallas-Fort Worth area.<\/p>\n
“Just looking at the reception that the Asian diaspora was able to bring for that game just showed me what the potential of American cricket could very well be,” Ashwin told ESPN<\/a> on Saturday. “It’s very exciting.”<\/p>\n This will be the first time Ashwin will be playing in a T20 league outside the IPL. USA has been making moves towards becoming a major destination for cricket in the lead up to the 2028 Los Angeles Olympic Games, where cricket will make a comeback after 128 years.<\/p>\n Ashwin had earlier signed up to play the 2025-26 BBL for Sydney Thunder, but was ruled out because of a knee injury<\/a> that required surgery.<\/p>\n “The fact that there is so much interest from the kids and from a lot of people who have come and settled in America and showing so much interest towards the game, I just wanted to come and experience what it is going to look like when we turn up for the MLC”<\/p>\n R Ashwin<\/p>\n “This will be the first time he’s played in a major global franchise competition outside of India,” Johnny Grave, the MLC chief executive, told ESPN. “And for us to be the first league to attract a player of this calibre is a testament to how the league’s developed over the last three years since it was launched back in 2023.”<\/p>\n Other players from India have switched to USA<\/a> and played cricket in MLC in the past, most notably former India Under-19 World Cup players Monank Patel and Harmeet Singh, who are also USA national team players.<\/p>\n “The fact that there is so much interest from the kids and from a lot of people who have come and settled in America and showing so much interest towards the game, I just wanted to come and experience what it is going to look like when we turn up for the MLC,” Ashwin said.<\/p>\n To add to the burgeoning USA-cricket relationship, three of the six MLC teams are owned by groups that own IPL teams – MI New York (Mumbai Indians), Texas Super Kings (Chennai Super Kings) and LA Knight Riders (Kolkata Knight Riders), the last of whom recently announced the launch of their own home venue<\/a>, in Pomona, California. More recently, Rajasthan Royals was sold<\/a> to a consortium of USA-based investors led by Arizona-based tech entrepreneur Kal Somani, with owners of two franchises in the American National Football League – Rob Walton (Denver Broncos) and Michael Hamp (Detroit Lions).<\/p>\n “All of this news flowed for the last few years has just meant that cricket is now more known to Americans,” Grave said. “And certainly when we go around talking to business partners, leaders, countries, cities, people have at least heard of cricket now. It’s certainly not an unknown sport here.”<\/p>\n Ashwin felt his participation in MLC was coming at a very important time for the sport.<\/p>\n “We are standing at one of the crux points for the game where it is fighting and fighting to break free in terms of globalising the particular sport,” he said. “So I think there will be a lot of freewill over the next decade in terms of how much people will want to engage and how many people will want to jump on-board.”<\/p>\n Unicorns have never won the MLC title. Their best finish was the loss to Washington Freedom in the 2024 final.<\/p>\n