Bad News for Shardul Thakur, Avesh Khan as they get removed from...

The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) on Monday announced the list of players who are part of the 2024-25 Central Contract for the men's team. Several players have retained their place in the list while a few have become a part of the Central Contract for the first time. However, there are some players as well who were part of the BCCI's Central Contract but have been dropped this year. These players include Shardul Thakur, Jitesh Sharma, KS Bharat, and Avesh Khan. Except for KS Bharat, all three other players are playing in IPL 2025 and are performing well for their respective franchises.

List of players rewarded with Central Contracts for first time (with grades):

Sarfaraz Khan - Grade C
Abhishek Sharma - Grade C
Nitish Kumar Reddy - Grade C
Akash Deep - Grade C
Varun Chakaravarthy - Grade C
Harshit Rana - Grade C

Meanwhile, Rohit Sharma, Virat Kohli, Jasprit Bumrah, and Ravindra Jadeja have been retained in the top-tier A+ category, with which they will earn Rs 7 crore annually. Apart from these, Grade A players include Mohammed Siraj, KL Rahul, Shubman Gill, Hardik Pandya, Mohammed Shami, and Rishabh Pant. On the other hand, Suryakumar Yadav, Kuldeep Yadav, Axar Patel, Yashasvi Jaiswal, and Shreyas Iyer fall in the Grade B category.

What are BCCI Central Contracts?

The BCCI Central Contracts are annual retainership agreements between the cricket board and selected Indian players, where they are guaranteed a fixed amount of money as remuneration. This system was first introduced in 2004 and the players are divided into four different categories, A+, A, B, and C. The A+ category players get Rs 7 crore annually, A get Rs 5 crore, B get Rs 3 crore and C get Rs 1 crore from BCCI.