The Pakistan Cricket Board on Thursday, 30 June, announced the men’s central contracts list for the 2022-23 season, with the introduction of separate red and white-ball contracts. Pakistan captain Babar Azam, wicket-keeper batter Mohammad Rizwan, opener Imam-ul-Haq and the pace-bowling duo of Shaheen Afridi and Hasan Ali were handed both red and white-ball contracts.The annual contracts are set to come into effect from July 1.
There is a 10 per cent increase in match fees across all formats, apart from an increase in match fee for non-playing members from 50 per cent to 70 per cent of the overall match fee. A captaincy allowance has been introduced to compensate the team captain for the additional responsibilities that come with that role.Most interestingly, PCB have announced that a separate fund will be created for 'elite players' in order to compensate for the loss in case they are offered contracts from leagues and franchises elsewhere, in case the board feels the need to manage their workload and dissuade them from participating. "[There will be] Allocation of an amount for current players with the aim to manage and reduce the workload of elite players and to ensure that they are fully fit, ready and fresh whenever they play for Pakistan," PCB stated in a release.In the red-ball contract list, Azhar Ali has been promoted to Category A, Abdullah Shafique, Naseem Shah have been placed in Category C and Saud Shakeel has made his entry with Category D (which also includes Abid Ali, Sarfaraz Ahmed, Shan Masood and Yasir Shah) Fawad Alam is the only player, apart from Hasan Ali to be slotted in category B.In the white-ball contract list, Fakhar Zaman and Shadab Khan have been promoted to Category A while Haris Rauf has been promoted to category B. Shahnawaz Dahani and Usman Qadir have been promoted from Emerging to Category D where they are joined by first-timers - Asif Ali, Haider Ali, Khushdil Shah, Mohammad Wasim Jnr and Zahid Mehmood.
