BCCI announces annual player retainership 2023-24 – Team India (Senior Men). Shreyas Iyer and Ishan Kishan were removed from central contracts.
On Wednesday, the Board of Control for Cricket in India revealed the Annual Player Contracts for Team India (Senior Men) for the 2023-24 season, covering the period from October 1st, 2023, to September 30th, 2024.
The BCCI splits the contract into four categories: Grade A+, Grade B, and Grade C. A+ is the highest, and Grade C is the lowest.
The players For Each Grade Listed Below
| Grade | Players |
| A+ | Rohit Sharma, Virat Kohli, Jasprit Bumrah, Ravindra Jadeja |
| A | R Ashwin, Mohammed Shami, Mohammed Siraj, KL Rahul, Shubman Gill, Hardik Pandya |
| B | Surya Kumar Yadav, Rishabh Pant, Kuldeep Yadav, Axar Patel, Yashasvi Jaiswal |
| C | 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, Rajat Patidar |
In the contract, the A+ grade encompasses four players, while the A grade includes six players. The B grade is constituted of five players, and the C grade comprises a total of 15 players.
Recommendation For Fast Bowling Contract
The Selection Committee has also recommended Fast Bowling contracts for the following athletes – Akash Deep, Vijaykumar Vyshak, Umran Malik, Yash Dayal and Vidwath Kaverappa.
Additionally, athletes who meet the criteria of playing a minimum of 3 Tests 8 ODIs or 10 T20Is within the specified period will automatically be included in Grade C on a pro-rata basis. For instance, Dhruv Jurel and Sarfaraz Khan, having played 2 Test matches so far, will be inducted into Grade C if they participate in the Dharamsala Test Match, i.e., the 5th Test of the ongoing series against England.
Shreyas Iyer and Ishan Kishan Removed From Central Contracts
Shreyas Iyer and Ishan Kishan were not considered for the annual contracts in this round of recommendations. There has been a lot of controversy recently regarding Shreyas Iyer and Ishan Kishan. Both avoided domestic cricket even after the BCCI informed players to participate in domestic tournaments when they were fit and not playing for India.
Shreyas Iyer pretended to have a back injury to skip playing in Ranji Trophy matches for Mumbai. Nitin Patel, linked to the National Cricket Academy in Bengaluru, revealed this to BCCI.
Ishan Kishan has not been part of the Indian team since he returned from South Africa, citing mental fatigue. The team granted him a break, and the team management expected him to play domestic cricket before considering him for the Indian side.
Despite training with his IPL skipper Hardik Pandya, Kishan did not participate in any game during the Ranji Trophy. A BCCI official had advised him to play in at least Jharkhand’s last game of the edition, but Kishan defied the requests and lost the central contract for this year.
The BCCI has recommended that all athletes give precedence to participating in domestic cricket during periods when they are not representing the national team.