Former India captain MS Dhoni has been left out from the annual player contracts for 2020 of the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI), which was announced on Thursday.
Overall 27 players have been selected in four grades- A+, A, B, and C.
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The salary cap of Grade A+ is 7 crore, while Grade A has a salary cap of Rs 5 crores, Grade B has a salary cap of Rs 3 crore and Grade C’s salary cap is Rs 1 crore.
Dhoni was placed in Grade A in the previous contract list.
Team India skipper Virat Kohli, opener Rohit Sharma and fast bowler Jasprit Bumrah were offered A+ contract.
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Five new players- Navdeep Saini, Mayank Agarwal, Shreyas Iyer, Washington Sundar and Deepak Chahar- were included in the list of 27 players who were offered the contracts by BCCI.
Dhoni last played for India in the World Cup semi-final against New Zealand on July 9, 2019, which Indian lost by 18 runs and since then he has been on a “sabbatical”.
Is the BCCI making a statement of sorts by leaving out Dhoni from the annual contract and does this mean his international career is over?
Dhoni, who was handed over team India captaincy in 2007 and under his captaincy India won the first T20 World Cup in 2007 and 2011 World Cup.
Under his captaincy, team India also won the Champion’s Trophy in 2013 and the Asia Cup T20 in 2016.
Here is the full list of players who have been given BCCI contract-
Grade A+
Virat Kohli, Rohit Sharma, and Jasprit Bumrah.
Grade A
Ravichandran Ashwin, Ravindra Jadeja, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Cheteshwar Pujara, Ajinkya Rahane, KL Rahul, Shikhar Dhawan, Mohd. Shami, Ishant Sharma, Kuldeep Yadav, and Rishabh Pant.
Grade B
Wriddhiman Saha, Umesh Yadav, Yuzvendra Chahal, Hardik Pandya, and Mayank Agarwal.
Grade C
Kedar Jadhav, Navdeep Saini, Deepak Chahar, Manish Pandey, Hanuma Vihari, Shardul Thakur, Shreyas Iyer, and Washington Sundar.