Ahead of the ICC ODI World Cup 2023, Pakistan players have received a happy news. Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) has decided to increase the salary of their top-category players by almost four times. PCB's A-category player are Babar Azam, Mohammad Rizwan and Shaheen Shah Afridi. As per a report in ESPNcricinfo, the trio is set to get as much as PKR 4.5 million ($15,900 approx) a month as a retainer. Earlier, their monthyl retainer was $4700. The contract had expired in June. And Pakistan players were without any contract for over a month. But the new contract will fill them with a lot of motivation.
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The monthly retainer of $15,900 is around Rs 13,14,612, which means annually the top-category players are now set to earn over Rs 1.5 crore (In INR). Earlier, Babar, Afridi and Rizwan earned less than Rs 4 lakh per month and less than Rs 50 lakh annually. Pakistani players were one of the poorest earning cricketers in the world. But the new contracts are going to change things soon.
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PCB is doing away with the last year's format of contracts wherein red ball and white players were split. Now, there will be four categories. We have already talked about the Category A above. 'B' Catergory players will get $10,600, and those in 'C' and 'D' will get somewhere around $2650 to $5300 per month.
From next year, PCB's income from ICC will also increase. They are set to receive more than double of what they earned in previous cycle. PCB will receive $34 million. This huge rise will help them pay their players well too.
Pakistani players earn less than majority of the elite international players as they don't play in cash-rich Indian Premier League (IPL) and face several paperwork issue while applying to play in other franchise-based T20 leagues around the world.
Compared to Indian cricketers, Pakistani players are still not paid as handsomly as them. BCCI has four Grades: A+, A, B and C. A+ grade players are Rohit Sharma, Virat Kohli, Jasprit Bumrah, Ravindra Jadeja. They get Rs 7 crore per year, almost six times more than what Babar, Rizwan and Shaheen will get as per new PCB contracts. Grade A players receive Rs 5 crore while Grade B players ger Rs 3 crore per year. Grade C player too get a crore each. BCCI's pay contracts are best in the world, all thanks to the major share of ICC money that lands in Indian cricket board's bank account.
