Sri Lanka to contract ‘A’ team cricketers

April 06, 2007 (LBO) -- Sri Lanka plans to contract cricketers for the A team for the first time in the island's history, to nurture talent for upcoming games and the national team, a senior official said Friday.









"We want to give our promising players an incentive to concentrate on the game for a longer period of time," he added.

The contract, which came into effect from April 1, covers a pool of around 18-20 players, Sri Lanka Cricket secretary K Mathivanan told LBO.

The sport's main governing body, has categorised players into three classes, with the top-guns getting 5,000 dollars each a year.

Players in category B will be paid 4,000 dollars and category C, will get 3,000 dollars.