BCCI Player Contracts: Yashasvi Jaiswal Makes it to Grade B; Mohammad Siraj, Shubman Gill Get Promotions

BCCI on Wednesday announced the annual player contracts for Team India (Senior Men) for the 2023-24 season with young upstart Yashasvi Jaiswal included in Grade B while Shubman Gill and Mohmmad Siraj have been promoted to Grade A from Grade B.

Rohit Sharma, Virat Kohli, Jasprit Bumrah and Ravindra Jadeja have been retained in Grade A+ while Axar Patel, Rishabh Pant have been demoted to Grade B from Grade A.

Notably, Shreyas Iyer and Ishan Kishan were not considered for the annual contracts in this round of recommendations, a BCCI statement read.

BCCI Terminates Central Contracts of Ishan Kishan and Shreyas Iyer

Apart from Jaiswal, Rinku Singh, Tilak Verma, Ruturaj Gaikwad, Shivam Dube, Ravi Bishnoi, Jitesh Sharma, Mukesh Kumar, Prasidh Krishna, Avesh Khan and Rajat Patidar are the new entrants to the annual retainership, while players to miss out from last year are Cheteshwar Pujara, Shikhar Dhawan, Umesh Yadav, Deepak Hooda and Yuzvendra Chahal, alongside Iyer and Kishan.

Shardul Thakur, Washington Sundar, Sanju Samson, Arshdeep Singh, KS Bharat retain their places in Grade C. Additionally, 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. 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, the BCCI released further stated.

The Selection Committee has also recommended fast bowling contracts for Akash Deep, Vijaykumar Vyshak, Umran Malik, Yash Dayal and Vidwath Kaverappa. The BCCI has also recommended that all athletes give precedence to participating in domestic cricket during periods when they are not representing the national team.

Grade A+ (4 Athletes)

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

Grade A (6 Athletes)

R Ashwin, Mohd. Shami, Mohd. 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.