Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma (PTI Photo/Kunal Patil) NEW DELHI: The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) on Monday announced the annual player contracts for the Indian senior men’s and women’s teams for the 2025-26 season. Interestingly, senior stars Rohit Sharma and Virat Kohli, who have retired from T20Is and Tests in the past few years but are regulars in ODIs, have been included in the B grade. In the previous edition, they were the only names to feature in the A+ grade alongside Jasprit Bumrah and Ravindra Jadeja.
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These contracts run from October 1, 2025 to September 30, 2026 and are a way for the board to reward players based on performance, importance to the team and consistency.Simply put, contracts are divided into grades, with Grade A being the highest grade. Players in this category are usually key match winners and regular starters. For this season, Shubman Gill, Jasprit Bumrah and Ravindra Jadeja have been placed in Grade A for the men’s team. This shows how important they are to India’s future plans, especially Gill as a lead batsman and Bumrah as India’s main fast bowler.On the women’s side, Harmanpreet Kaur, Smriti Mandhana, Jemimah Rodrigues and Deepti Sharma are in A grade. These players have been the backbone of the Indian women’s team, performing brilliantly with both bat and ball and leading the way in major tournaments.While Kohli and Rohit remain big names and experienced leaders, the change could reflect a shift towards younger players and a new phase in Indian cricket where the focus is slowly shifting to the next generation.BCCI Annual Player Contracts for the Indian Senior Men’s Team
- Grade A: Shubman Gill, Jasprit Bumrah, Ravindra Jadeja
- Grade B: Virat Kohli, Rohit Sharma, Washington Sundar, KL Rahul, Mohammed Siraj, Hardik Pandya, Rishabh Pant, Kuldeep Yadav, Yashasvi Jaiswal, Suryakumar Yadav, Shreyas Iyer.
- Grade C: Axar Patel, Tilak Varma, Rinku Singh, Shivam Dube, Sanju Samson, Arshdeep Singh, Prasidh Krishna, Akash Deep, Dhruv Jurel, Harshit Rana, Varun Chakravarthy, Nitish Reddy, Abhishek Gama, Sai Sudharsan, Ruwaj Bishno
BCCI Annual Player Contracts for the Indian Senior Women’s Team
- Class A: Harmanpreet Kaur, Smriti Mandhana, Jemimah Rodrigues, Deepti Sharma
- Grade B: Renuka Singh, Shafali Verma, Richa Ghosh, Sneh Rana
- Grade C: Radha Yadav, Amanjot Kaur, Pratika Rawal, Kranti Gaud, Uma Chetry, Arundhati Reddy, Sree Charani, Yastika Bhatia, Harleen Deol, Kashvee Gautam, G Kamalini, Vaishnavi Sharma, Tejal Hasabnis
