Pakistan board to downsize list of centrally contracted cricketers

The Pakistan Cricket Board plans to reduce the number of centrally contracted players for the 2024/25 season. This move follows recommendations from foreign coaches and aims to reward players committed to top fitness levels.

In Short

• PCB to announce revised contracts list before team tours Australia
• Babar Azam, Rizwan and Shaheen will remain in top A plus category
• Fitness tests and performance crucial in determining contract recipients

The PCB in all likelihood will prune the list of centrally contracted from 27 last year as per directive from two foreign coaches, Gary Kirsten (white ball) and Jason Gillespie (red ball), with skipper Shan Masood being party to the decision. It is believed that PCB will announce the list for the 2024/25 season before the national squad leaves for its tour of Australia, Zimbabwe and South Africa on October 29.

"There is a lot of work going on finalising the list of players who will get these lucrative contracts but the announcement will be made before the team leaves so that they are not distracted during the test series against England," an official source in the board said on Saturday. "You can expect demotions of players, promotions of a few and the addition and exclusion of some players in the new list," the source said.

He said despite the demotions, promotions etc the number of players will be reduced in numbers. "The recent fitness tests and performances of players have been taken into consideration while discussing which players should get the contracts," he said.

"Kirsten and Gillispie have laid a lot of stress on fitness and rewarded those players who are independently focussed on becoming top fit professionals."

Former captain Babar Azam, the new expected white-ball captain, Muhammad Rizwan and Shaheen Shah Afridi will remain in the top A plus category but there are expected to be some demotions and promotions in the other categories with some unlucky to be dropped from the list.

Muhammad Nawaz, Imad Wasim, Sarfaraz Ahmed, Ihsanullah, Shahnawaz Dahani, Hasan Ali, etc could end up losing their contracts. Last year also the PCB announced the centrally contracted list of players after a long delay just before the team left for India to play in the World Cup.

The contract period runs from July to July but last year the delay occurred because of prolonged negotiations between the players and board leading to the PCB agreeing to give the players a 3 per cent stake in the shares it gets from the ICC and a major hike in players' match fee: including 50% increment in Tests, 25% in ODIs and 12.5% in T20 internationals.

Unfortunately, the source said since the performance of the team had been going down since last year the board wanted to ensure a performance related system when giving contracts which is why numbers will be reduced.

There is an unease among some players over the delay in the announcement of the contracts and also the delay in the board disbursing their monthly retainers, sponsorship fees and shares from ICC revenues for three months.