The first ever international cricket match in recorded history was played between Canada and the United States in 1844. There were countries such as Argentina, Denmark and France which used to have a large number of cricket clubs. All that is history now, because the ICC was never interested in any region outside the traditional commonwealth (South Asia, England, Australia-NZ.etc). Outside the 5-6 test nations, cricket continues to decline and that is true even for some of the test nations such as Ireland, South Africa, West Indies and most of the Associate nations.
No doubt cricket is having very long history but sadly due to his nature and system it has never been adoptable for many countries even we have some very unauthentic stories about this but with the recent changes happening these can give some big change and better result in adoption because with this many countries and sports authorities feeling now they can take good profit with in short period like they have in soccer and rugby.
But, sadly we have no mainstream for this all which is the biggest concern like you are saying we are losing passion in many test playing nations, so I am feeling after one decade we will watch just 20/20 and 10league and similar other short formats because test could be disappeared from scene and this is good for players management and all related parties.