New Delhi: The Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) announced central contracts for the 2024-25 international season. There are some big surprises in Pakistan’s new central contracts list as premier pacers Shaheen Shah Afridi and Haris Rauf have both been demoted. On the other hand, former Pakistan captain Babar Azam has been retained in the ‘A’ category despite recently losing his spot in the Test squad.
Shaheen, who was also one of the senior players dropped from Pakistan’s Test squad for the last two Test matches of the recently concluded Test series against England at home, has been demoted from the A category to the B category. Rauf has been demoted from the B category to the C category. Meanwhile, Fakhar Zaman, Imad Wasim and opening batter Imam-ul-Haq have been completely ignored from the central contracts list.
Shaheen was appointed as Pakistan’s T20I captain following the sacking of Babar Azam post the 2023 ODI World Cup. However, the pacer was later replaced by Babar in the T20 World Cup 2024 earlier this year and was accused of non-cooperative attitude during the tournament which was played in the USA and the West Indies.
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Shaheen was dropped from Pakistan’s squad for the first Test against Bangladesh at home and was also ignored from the squad for the 1st Test against England before getting dropped for the next two matches. Pakistan went on to win the 2nd and 3rd Tests in Babar and Shaheen’s absence to come from behind and clinch the three-match series 2-0.
Haris had refused to play in the Test series against Australia last year which led to his central contract being terminated. However, the pacer was later reinstated in the central contracts list and was also given the NOC to play in the Big Bash League. However, with Rauf not featuring in Tests, the pacer has been demoted to the C category.
Check out the complete list of central contracts awarded by PCB:
Category A: Babar Azam and Mohammad Rizwan
Category B: Naseem Shah, Shaheen Shah Afridi and Shan Masood
Category C (9): Abdullah Shafique, Abrar Ahmed, Haris Rauf, Noman Ali, Saim Ayub, Sajid Khan, Salman Ali Agha, Saud Shakeel and Shadab Khan
Category D (11): Aamir Jamal, Haseebullah, Kamran Ghulam, Khurram Shahzad, Mir Hamza, Mohammad Abbas Afridi, Mohammad Ali, Mohammad Hurraira, Muhammad Irfan Khan, Mohammad Wasim Jnr and Usman Khan
Babar, Rizwan only players in A category
