5 Things to Note about the new BCCI cricket contracts
The BCCI is metamorphosing with Shashank Manohar at its helm. Manohar could almost be the Thomas Cromwell in The Wolf Hall, but history has never been kind to those who are on a mission to clean a system up. Although BCCI is pulling itself out of the mire, the shadows of the past are still long enough to cast an influence and much needs to be done.Nevertheless, amidst talk about conflicts of interest, the future of cricket and keeping BCCI business transparent, the player contracts were rolled out. A few things are very clear from this contract and one wonders if these contracts could offer incentives to the current team that has taken a 1-0 lead against South Africa in Mohali before moving to Bengaluru.Not much looks wrong with the contracts at first sight but if nit-picking were allowed a few more things could’ve been tinkered with.Promotions: Ajinkya Rahane (A)New contracts: Harbhajan Singh (C) and Sreenath Aravind (C).Demotions: Suresh Raina (B), Bhuvneshwar Kumar (B) and Ravindra Jadeja (C),Out of contract: R Vinay Kumar, Robin Uthappa, Kuldeep Yadav, Sanju Samson, Manoj Tiwary, Parvez Rasool, Pankaj Singh and Pragyan Ojha.
#5 The rates haven\'t gone up
The contracts were a long time coming, owing to delays caused by IPL corruption issues. Nevertheless, the BCCI hasn’t exactly splurged on its players. Not only has the number of contracts gone down, the retainer has also remained the same as it was two years ago.
Although the contracts are not the end all for players, who can still get contracts if they play a minimum of three international games, it is a warning sign for a lot of players who have to buck up to retain their contracts. Jadeja for example, has been demoted from B to C, coinciding with his fall from the team stakes.