The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) has announced the annual player contract list for 2023-24. Wicketkeeper batter Ishan Kishan along with Shreyas Iyer are both missing from the list of players to have received the contract. While Iyer was part of Grade B in the BCCI contract last year, Kishan had received a Grade C contract. Both the players, despite warnings from the Board, had not taken part in the Ranji Trophy and have consequently lost the contracts with Rohit Sharma, Virat Kohli, Jasprit Bumrah and Ravindra Jadeja being the 4 players to receive a A+ Grade contract.

Grade A+ (4 Athletes)

Rohit Sharma, Virat Kohli, Jasprit Bumrah and Ravindra Jadeja.

Grade A (6 Athletes)

R Ashwin, Mohammed Shami, Mohdammed Siraj, KL Rahul, Shubman Gill and Hardik Pandya.

Grade B (5 Athletes)

Surya Kumar Yadav, Rishabh Pant, Kuldeep Yadav, Axar Patel and Yashasvi Jaiswal.

Grade C (15 Athletes)

Rinku Singh, Tilak Verma, Ruturaj Gaekwad, Shardul Thakur, Shivam Dube, Ravi Bishnoi, Jitesh Sharma, Washington Sundar, Mukesh Kumar, Sanju Samson, Arshdeep Singh, KS Bharat, Prasidh Krishna, Avesh Khan and Rajat Patidar.

Criteria Set For Automatic Entry In Grade C Category

Meanwhile, a criteria has been set for an automatic entry in the Grade C Category of the BCCI Central Contract by the Indian Cricket Board. “Athletes who meet the criteria of playing a minimum of 3 Tests or 8 ODIs or 10 T20Is within the specified period will automatically be included in Grade C on a pro-rata basis,” an official release from BCCI read.

Thus if the likes of Dhruv Jurel and Sarfaraz Khan who have already played 2 Test matches, end up featuring in the fifth Test match of the ongoing series against England, they will automaticaly get a Grade C contract by virtue of having played 3 Test matches.

In addition, the selection committee has recommended fast bowling contracts for Akash Deep, Vijaykumar Vyshak, Umran Malik, Yash Dayal and Vidwath Kaverappa. The Board, however, was quick to add that the players give “precedence to playing domestic cricket” when not playing for Team India, a message which is seemingly directed at Ishan Kishan and Shreayas Iyer.