Xtratime Web Desk: A few days back Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) announced its annual player contracts list for the period from October 2020 till September 2021. Indian senior mens’ cricket team is in very good form at recent past. They completed a historic Test series win in Australia after winning the final test at Brisbane,Gabba in grand fashion.They decimated England in the home test series and also won T-20 and One-day series versus them. After the Ongoing Indian Premier League season national team would feature in World Test Championship final to be played at Southampton,England and 2021 World T20 to be held in India later this year.
As per the new contracted players list, only Hardik Pandya (B to A) and Shardul Thakur (C to B) are the two cricketers who have received a promotion. Bhuvneshwar Kumar was demoted from Grade A to Grade B because of his injury woes. Wrist-spin duo of Kuldeep Yadav and Yuzvendra Chahal have received a downgraded contract of Grade C.
We now try to take a look at the list of contracted players and find out the notable inculsions and exclusions from the list for the season 2020-21.
1) Md. Siraj (Grade -C inclusion) ;-
Mohammed Siraj was primarily selected as a reserve pacer in Australia tour. Due to the injuries to many first team cricketers he got included into the playing XI and by the time series ended he had become the leader of the bowling attack. He was India’s highest wicket-taker in that series as he picked up 13 wickets at an average of 29.53.
2) Manish Pandey (excluded) :-
Manish Pandey’s exclusion from this list surprised many. National selectors given it a hins when he was ignored for the home ODI series against England. Incidentally Pandey was in the squad in recent limited-overs series agains Australia. Players like Suryakumar Yadav, Rishabh Pant, Ishan Kishan’s recent brilliant performance with the bat ensured difficult times for Manish Pandey in the coming times. Former players like Ashish Nehra have opined that Pandey’s inability to quickly adapt to the game situation, and perform under pressure is the prime reason for him not being a regular pick for the national side.
3) Kedar Jadhav (excluded) :-
Like Manish Pandey’s omission from the contracted players list Kedar Jadhav’s exclusion was not a surprise at all. In the last year’s Indian Premier League (IPL) played at Emirates he performed very poorly with the bat for Chennai SUper KIngs. Jadhav was part of the ODI team as a like-to-like replacement of Suresh Raina. As Jadhav is getting older day by day and his form dropping his exclusion was not a surprise at all.
4) T. Natarajan (excluded) :-
Thangarasu Natarajan , the left arm pacer burst onto the scene for Sunrisers Hyderabad (SRH) in last year’s edition of IPL. His ability to bowl yorker at death overs at ease earned him the tag of ‘yorker king’. He was selected in Australia tour as a net bowler. Later on due to injuries to multiple cricketers from first XI he got the chance to play in the first team in all the formats. Going by his recent form it was a huge surprise that he was not included in the list of contracted players list.
5) Axar Patel (Grade C inclusion) :
Axar Patel will be making his re-entry in the Grade C list after 2017-18. Axar Patel played in place of injured Ravindra Jadeja in the home Test series against England. The all-rounder took 27 wickets in his 3 Test matches as he became the highest wicket taker in the history of the game in his debut test series. After this performance of his this inclusion was in the expected line.
6) Shubhman Gill (Grade C inclusion) :
Kolkata Knight Riders opener Shubman Gill was in red hot form with the bat in Australian Test series . He was prolific run scorer for India in that innings.His innings of 91 runs in the final day of Gabba test ensured a historic series win for India. After that performnce Gill is a automatic choice to come into contracted players list.