| Player: | A Nehra, IK Pathan |
DateLine: 26th November 2009
Indian fast bowler Ashish Nehra has been given a retainer contract by the BCCI for 2009-10, capping a remarkable comeback from injury this year. Nehra replaced allrounder Irfan Pathan in the Grade B list for an annual central contract worth Rs 40 lakh.
Irfan's name was missing altogether from the initial list of contracted players issued by the BCCI, but was included later in the day in Grade C with the board saying he'd been "erroneously" left out.
Praveen Kumar and Dinesh Karthik were the others to benefit, both moving up a grade. Karthik is now in Grade C (Rs 25 lakh) while Praveen moves up to Grade B.
Irfan apart, the players demoted include S Badrinath, who slipped to Group C from B last year, and Piyush Chawla, who has moved one step down to D. There were four new entries in India's latest retainer list - Abhishek Nayar, Dhawal Kulkarni, Ajinkya Rahane and Manoj Tiwary.
Grade A (Rs 60 lakh) : Sachin Tendulkar, MS Dhoni, Gautam Gambhir, Virender Sehwag, Rahul Dravid, VVS Laxman, Yuvraj Singh, Zaheer Khan, Harbhajan Singh.
Grade B (Rs 40 lakh) : Suresh Raina, Rohit Sharma, Munaf Patel, RP Singh, Ishant Sharma, Praveen Kumar, Ashish Nehra.
Grade C (Rs 25 lakh) : S Badrinath, Wasim Jaffer, Irfan Pathan, Yusuf Pathan, Pragyan Ojha, Sreesanth, Dinesh Karthik, Amit Mishra.
Grade D (Rs 15 lakh) : Piyush Chawla, Ravindra Jadeja, Robin Uthappa, Parthiv Patel, Cheteshwar Pujara, Mohammad Kaif, Virat Kohli, Ashok Dinda, Wriddhiman Saha, M Vijay, R Ashwin, Shikhar Dhawan, Sudeep Tyagi, Dhawal Kulkarni, Abhishek Nayar, Ajinkya Rahane, Manoj Tiwary.