England Cricket 2023

The Central Contracts have been announced:

Three years:
Harry Brook (Yorkshire), Joe Root (Yorkshire), Mark Wood (Durham)

Two years:
Rehan Ahmed (Leicestershire), Jofra Archer (Sussex), Gus Atkinson (Surrey), Jonathan Bairstow (Yorkshire), Jos Buttler (Lancashire), Bryson Carse (Durham), Zak Crawley (Kent), Sam Curran (Surrey), Ben Duckett (Nottinghamshire), Liam Livingstone (Lancashire), Ollie Pope (Surrey), Matthew Potts (Durham), Adil Rashid (Yorkshire), Josh Tongue, (Nottinghamshire - from November 1), Chris Woakes (Warwickshire)

One year:
Moeen Ali (Warwickshire), James Anderson (Lancashire), Ben Foakes (Surrey), Jack Leach (Somerset), Dawid Malan (Yorkshire), Ollie Robinson (Sussex), Ben Stokes (Durham), Reece Topley (Surrey).

England Development Contracts:
Matthew Fisher (Yorkshire), Saqib Mahmood (Lancashire), John Turner (Hampshire).

Stokes, by all accounts, was offered a three year deal but has chosen to take a one year deal. Retirement in the offing?

Archer's two year deal is a questionable one given his ongoing injury problems that has meant he hasn't played a Test in the last two years and just seven ODIs and T20s in total in that time. I accept that the fear is that he will go off and play franchise otherwise but it is a big commitment to someone who will probably want to do that even with a CC.

I suppose we had little choice other than to offer Bairstow two years though I'm really not sure that he is player he once was and doesn't look like he has fully got over his golfing injury. It's, once again, an insult to Foakes that, by contrast, he has only been offered a 12 month deal. If the ECB are mindful of the advent of a Rew, Smith or Robinson (Durham) then I could understand it but surely Bairstow should be in the same bracket?

One year for Sussex's Robinson says quite a lot given that Wood has a three year contract and the likes of Archer, Potts, Atkinson, Tongue, Carse and Woakes have all been given two years. He's only 29 but the question marks about his attitude and ability to keep himself fit enough to play Test cricket are clearly there.  

Three years for Root? No wonder he's calling for the abolition of The Blast.   

No new deals for Roy, Willey, Jamie and Craig Overton and Olly Stone. Perhaps the surprising omission is Jacks who made his England debut across all three formats in the last year.

lolwray said:

Seems a very odd time to announce them now  .Quite a few names there can think themselves quite fortunate. I am assuming the ECB have been this generous to protect themselves from some of them becoming full time franchise cricketers 

The contracts run from 1st October to 30th September so, I suppose, there's only so much time they can delay such an announcement by given that the players would have, presumably, been told at the end of September. But I agree the form of one or two in this WC does appear generous. Perhaps knowing that they are getting paid as much as £700,000 per annum does diminish the hunger a bit. And some will still play for as many franchises as they can regardless e.g. Root playing T20 which he isn't particularly cut out to do in the UAE instead of playing for England in an ODI series against South Africa in what is WC year. 

MarcusH26 said:

Do the ECB have something against Sam Hain? Shocked he's not in the ODI squad. 

For whatever reason, it is evident that they just don't rate him. 

So, Willey was one of our few success stories of the WC and wasn't offered a Central Contract because he wasn't deemed to be the future. Another of our better performers was Malan. Now Willey is more than three years younger than Malan but the latter was given a Central Contract. some six weeks ago. But we now discover that Malan is unlikely to play for England again. Someone please tell me why this doesn't smack of muddled thinking? 

Dawid Malan is the biggest casualty as England seek to revive their white-ball teams in the wake of a woeful World Cup campaign. Malan has been left out of both the T20 and ODI squads for next month’s tour of the Caribbean and although Rob Key, the managing director of cricket, said it was possible for him to regain his place for the T20 World Cup next summer, it is unlikely Malan, 36, will be seen in England colours again.