BCCI central contracts: Virat Kohli, Rohit Sharma in Grade B?
What's the story
The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) is considering a major revamp of its annual central contract system. The proposed changes, suggested by the selection committee led by Ajit Agarkar, include scrapping the Grade A+ category and retaining only three categories: A, B, and C. If approved at the next apex council meeting, this could result in veterans Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma being demoted to Grade B.
Contract breakdown
A look at current structure
The BCCI central contracts are annual retainers given to Indian cricketers. They are divided into four grades: A+, A, B, and C. Each grade comes with a hefty annual fee on top of match fees. The current structure sees players in the A+ category earning ₹7 crore annually, those in the A category earning ₹5 crore, players in the B category earning ₹3 crore, and those in the C category earning ₹1 crore annually.
Contract revision
Implications of proposed changes
The proposed changes by the selection committee would mean a major shift in the contract structure. If approved, it would leave only three categories: A, B, and C. This could see players like Kohli and Rohit demoted to Grade B. The two veteran batters currently play only ODI cricket, having retired from the Test and T20I formats.
Player status
Current A+ category players
Currently, the A+ category features top cricketers like Rohit, Kohli, Jasprit Bumrah, and Ravindra Jadeja. However, only Bumrah is currently active in all three formats, though is workload has been a bone of contention. Jadeja has already retired from T20Is. If BCCI accepts this proposal to scrap the A+ category, these players could be demoted to lower-paying categories.
Category distribution
Current players in other categories
The current contract structure features Rishabh Pant, Mohammed Shami, Mohammed Siraj, KL Rahul, Shubman Gill, and Hardik Pandya in the A category. Suryakumar Yadav, Kuldeep Yadav, Axar Patel, Shreyas Iyer, and Yashasvi Jaiswal are placed in B grade. Grade C: Rinku Singh, Tilak Verma, Ruturaj Gaikwad, Shivam Dube, Ravi Bishnoi, Washington Sundar, Mukesh Kumar, Sanju Samson, Arshdeep Singh, Prasidh Krishna, Rajat Patidar, Dhruv Jurel, Sarafraz Khan, Nitish Reddy, Ishan Kishan, Abhishek Sharma, Akash Deep, Varun Chakravarthy, and Harshit Rana.