Lankan cricketers 'threaten to quit' over vagueness of new contract: report
A number of Sri Lankan cricketers threatened to retire prematurely if the Sri Lanka Cricket (SLC) fails to clarify the new point system that evaluates the players and decides their annual pay pack, claimed the country's newspaper The Sunday Times.
The Sri Lankan team are currently on a tour of Bangladesh for a three-match ODI series starting later this month. None of the players included in the tour are yet to sign the new contract. They are playing in a tour-based contract.
According to the new points system, players have now been categorised into four groups. The point system prioritises levels of fitness, discipline, performance in international and domestic cricket during the last two years, leadership and overall value to the team.
According to the report, Sri Lankan players could lose as much as US$ 50,000 in their annual earnings compared to the previous year.
They are now demanding that the Board discloses the points allotted to each in order to understand the thought process.
"Each individual player very correctly believes they are entitled to a disclosure on the points allotted which categorised their ranking," Attorney-at-Law Nishan Sydney Premathiratne, the player representative in the SLC contract negotiations, told the Sunday Times.
"Transparency would also create unity and harmony. All players are in unison seeking this information. Transparency is paramount so that the players also know how they were assessed and what weaknesses they need to address," Mr Premathiratne was quoted as saying in the report.
SLC, however, said that the information will remain confidential.
"We are no longer going to offer a contract on seniority or any other personal preferences but only after evaluating the overall performance of a player based on the new criteria," an SLC official said to The Sunday Times on the condition of anonymity.
"We were to give them the contracts last week but we could not do it because of the lockdown. So, we will give the contracts next week and whoever wants to sign can do so. The others can sign tour contracts. We have no issue with that. But we will not compromise the system in place and are not willing to divulge these vital pieces of information."
The Lankan players have been given time till the end of the month to sign the contract.
Comments