The Board of Control for Cricket in India has proclaimed the list of Annual Player Contracts for Team India (Senior Men) for the period from October 2019 to September 2020. The surprising factor is that the veteran player MS Dhoni is not on this list. His exclusion has given the clue of his future plans.
After World Cup 2019, MS Dhoni hasn’t played a single game for the national team and his last match was the semifinal of the ODI showpiece against New Zealand. He went on to make himself unavailable in the whole-home season. His sabbatical break created speculations about his retirement plan. But the team management hinted he might return for the T20 World Cup. Albeit not giving the contract to the former Indian captain has increased the talks of retirement.
Young Players included in the list:
The pacer Navdeep Saini, Deepak Chahar, the allrounder Washington Sundar and Test specialist Hanuma Vihari are included in the list. These four players are included in the Grade C category of the contract.
Distribution of Annual Player Contracts Team India (Senior Men)
| Period | Grade A + | Grade A | Grade B | Grade C |
| Oct 2019 to Sept 2020 | INR 7 Cr | INR 5 Cr | INR 3 Cr | INR 1 Cr |
Grade A+ Includes:
| Grade | S.No. | Athletes |
| A+ | 1 | Mr Virat Kohli |
| 2 | Mr Rohit Sharma | |
| 3 | Mr Jasprit Bumrah |
Grade A Includes:
| Grade | S.No. | Athletes |
| A | 1 | Mr. Ravichandran Ashwin |
| 2 | Mr. Ravindra Jadeja | |
| 3 | Mr. Bhuvneshwar Kumar | |
| 4 | Mr. Cheteshwar Pujara | |
| 5 | Mr. Ajinkya Rahane | |
| 6 | Mr K L Rahul | |
| 7 | Mr Shikhar Dhawan | |
| 8 | Mr Mohd. Shami | |
| 9 | Mr Ishant Sharma | |
| 10 | Mr Kuldeep Yadav | |
| 11 | Mr Rishabh Pant |
Grade B Includes:
| Grade | S.No. | Athletes |
| B | 1 | Mr. Wriddhiman Saha |
| 2 | Mr. Umesh Yadav | |
| 3 | Mr. Yuzvendra Chahal | |
| 4 | Mr. Hardik Pandya | |
| 5 | Mr. Mayank Agarwal |
Grade C Includes:
| Grade | S.No. | Athletes |
| C | 1 | Mr. Kedar Jadhav |
| 2 | Mr. Navdeep Saini | |
| 3 | Mr. Deepak Chahar | |
| 4 | Mr. Manish Pandey | |
| 5 | Mr. Hanuma Vihari | |
| 6 | Mr. Shardul Thakur | |
| 7 | Mr. Shreyas Iyer | |
| 8 | Mr. Washington Sundar |
It would be interesting to note MS Dhoni’s decision after his exclusion from the contract. Dhoni will be back playing for Chennai Super Kings in the Indian Premier League 2020.