Kishan & Shreyas Iyer Return As BCCI Announce Central Contracts

Shreyas Iyer & Ishan Kishan have been named in the BCCI's central contracted list of players. Last year, both Iyer & Kishan lost their central contracts owing to fitness issues. The BCCI announced the list of centrally contracted players on Monday (April 21). Seven new players have been added to the central contract, which will be valid from October 1, 2024, to September 30, 2025.

The 34-player list has resorted to the older format with players getting contracts in four categories: A+, A, B & C. The star Indian quartet featuring Rohit Sharma, Virat Kohli, Ravindra Jadeja & Jasprit Bumrah have retained their A+ contracts. Last year, BCCI had issued a special contract for the fast bowlers, but this time around, they've scrapped the idea of giving a different contract to the fast bowlers.

While in the A category saw the Indian Wicket-keeper batter Rishabh Pant getting promoted from Category B. Pant is now slated alongside Shubman Gill, KL Rahul, Hardik Pandya, Mohammed Shami & Mohammad Siraj. The category more or less remained the same, with only R Ashwin getting excluded, having announced retirement from International Cricket last year.

Iyer, who has returned to the Central contract list, found his spot in Category B. The star Mumbai batter is placed alongside T20I skipper Suryakumar Yadav, ace spinners Kuldeep Yadav & Axar Patel, with Yashasvi Jaiswal completing the 'B' category.

Iyer & Kishan Make a Return In Central Contract List

Category C saw the most edits being made by the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) as the quartet of Shivam Dube, KS Bharat, Avesh Khan & Jitesh Sharma have all been left out of the central contract list. The reports swarming around about Abhishek Sharma, Harshit Rana & Nitish Reddy getting a central contract have come true as the troika has been granted a Grade C contract by the BCCI. The list also features young guns Dhruv Jurel, Ishan Kishan, Sarfaraz Khan & Ruturaj Gaikwad to name a few.

Central Contract List:

Grade A+ (4 Athletes): Rohit Sharma, Virat Kohli, Jasprit Bumrah, and Ravindra Jadeja

Grade A (6 Athletes): Rishabh Pant, Mohammed Shami, Mohammed Siraj, KL Rahul, Shubman Gill, and Hardik Pandya

Grade B (5 Athletes): Suryakumar Yadav, Kuldeep Yadav, Axar Patel, Shreyas Iyer and Yashasvi Jaiswal.

Grade C (19 Athletes): Rinku Singh, Tilak Verma, Ruturaj Gaikwad, Shivam Dube, Ravi Bishnoi, Washington Sundar, Mukesh Kumar, Sanju Samson, Arshdeep Singh, Prasidh Krishna, Rajat Patidar, Dhruv Jurel, Sarafraz Khan, Nitish Reddy, Ishan Kishan, Abhishek Sharma, Akash Deep, Varun Chakaravarthy and Harshit Rana

IN: Dhruv Jurel, Sarafraz Khan, Nitish Reddy, Ishan Kishan, Abhishek Sharma, Varun Chakaravarthy, Harshit Rana, Shreyas Iyer, Akash Deep

OUT: Shardul Thakur, Jitesh Sharma, KS Bharath, Avesh Khan, Vijaykumar Vyshak, Umran Malik, Yash Dayal, and Vidwath Kaverappa

Promoted: Rishabh Pant (From Category B to A)

Retired: R Ashwin