'Central contracts to be decided after at least two more series'

Bangladesh Cricket Board director Akram Khan today told the media that they will be viewing performances of at least the next two series before drawing up the central contract of the national team players.

"Every year we watch the performances before drawing up the final list. Since we haven't been able to gauge performances this year, we will keep the current centrally contracted players for two series before taking our decision. Everything will be discussed by the board before taking a decision," Akram told the media today.

Last year in March, BCB had for the very first time enacted different contracts for red-ball cricket as 17 players were named in the list of players with central contracts. Tamim Iqbal, Liton Das, Nazmul Hossain Shanto, Mushfiqur Rahim, Mohammad Mithun, Taijul Islam and Mehedi Hasan Miraz were included in both white-ball and red-ball categories.

Mominul Haque, Nayeem Hasan, Abu Jayed and Ebadot Hossain had been included solely for red-ball cricket while T20I skipper Mahmudullah Riyad along with Mohammad Saifuddin, Mustafizur Rahman, Afif Hossain and Mohammad Naim formed the list of players who have gotten white-ball contracts.

The likes of Soumya Sarkar, Najmul Hossain, Mohammad Mithun, Ebadot Hossain, Afif and Naim were the newest addition to the central contract. Then ODI captain Mashrafe Bin Mortaza had requested to not include him in the central contract while Shakib Al Hasan had missed out following his ban. Shakib is expected to be included this time as his ban has come to an end.