The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) has released the list of annual central contracts for the 2024-25 season, reflecting a number of significant changes in player categories, promotion of young stars, and dropping of some regulars. The retainer format remains in four categories: A+, A, B, and C, although the BCCI hasn’t formally revealed salary figures. According to reports, Grade A+ players take home INR 7 crore, Grade A INR 5 crore, Grade B INR 3 crore, and Grade C INR 1 crore.
Top Tier (A+): No Change Except Ashwin’s Exit
The top Grade A+ remains to boast India’s biggest stars: Rohit Sharma, Virat Kohli, Jasprit Bumrah, and Ravindra Jadeja. The only difference in this category is R Ashwin’s exclusion, as he had retired from international cricket towards the fag end of last year.
Interestingly enough, Rohit, Kohli, and Jadeja have managed to hold on to their elite positions even after retiring from T20Is following India’s winning T20 World Cup 2024 campaign.
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Grade A: Pant Returns
A notable upgrade sees Rishabh Pant promoted back to Grade A, marking a significant step in his comeback story. After being demoted last season due to a long injury layoff from his 2022 car accident, Pant has bounced back by featuring in all formats in the past year — including ten Tests, one ODI, and ten T20Is.
Grade A has also got top performers such as KL Rahul, Mohammed Siraj, Hardik Pandya, Shubman Gill, and Mohammed Shami.
Grade B: Shreyas Iyer And Kuldeep Lead The Line
Shreyas Iyer, though deprived of a higher grade, ends up in Grade B, and he is accompanied by Kuldeep Yadav, Axar Patel, Yashasvi Jaiswal, and present T20I skipper Suryakumar Yadav.
Grade C: New Faces Join In
The Grade C list welcomes a new set of promising new entrants in the form of Nitish Kumar Reddy, Dhruv Jurel, Abhishek Sharma, Sarfaraz Khan, Akash Deep, Varun Chakravarthy, and Harshit Rana – all receiving their first central contracts.
The exclusions include Shardul Thakur, KS Bharat, Avesh Khan, and Jitesh Sharma, who had been included in Grade C in the previous cycle.
