Sports Correspondent
Lahore
The philosophy of professionalism and its connection with performance, which, in turn, provides big rewards and incentives to the best-performing cricketers, is the essence of the 2020-21 domestic cricket season, which commences on 30 September.
Once the lowly paid top domestic cricket performers now have the opportunity to earn as high as PKR3.2million, which is 83 per cent more than 2019-20, and as low as PKR1.8million, still a seven per cent increase from what the players in the highest category received last year.
These player earnings can be calculated following the announcement of the 2020-21 domestic cricket schedule, that provides the best of the best cricketers the opportunity to feature in all 10 National T20 Cup, 10 Quaid-e-Azam Trophy and 10 Pakistan Cup matches.
With each of the 10 A+ category players to receive PKR150,000 as monthly retainer for 12 months and a match fee of PKR40,000 for National T20 Cup and Pakistan Cup each, and PKR60,000 for Quaid-e-Azam Trophy, players maintaining and displaying high levels of professionalism throughout the season will earn PKR3.2million.
And, this doesn’t stop here. Players can increase their earnings if they reach the finals, which will guarantee them additional match fee as well as share in the prize money.
Similarly, the monthly retainer of D category domestic players is PKR40,000 but they will get the same match fee as the highest category player. This, in turn, means any D category player who features in all the 30 First XI league matches will earn PKR1.8million. These numbers will increase if a player’s side reaches the finals as this will mean more matches and share in prize moneys.
This earning is more than seven per cent of what domestic contracted players received in the 2019-20 season. Last year, all the domestic contracted First XI players had received a flat monthly retainer of PKR50,000 and match fee of PKR40,000 for white-ball cricket and PKR75,000 for red-ball cricket.