Sri Lanka Cricket announces list of players with central contracts for 2022-23 season

Sri Lanka Cricket (SLC) has announced the list of centrally contracted players for the upcoming year 2022-2023 and it includes 19 players grouped in various categories. According to SLC CEO Ashley de Silva, all the cricketers have signed contracts, unlike last year when the players had raised queries about being offered a performance-based contract. In addition to that, the Sri Lanka Cricket Board had also raised the benchmark for fitness levels which wasn’t welcomed as well last year.

Coming back to the central contracts, the players have been grouped into five categories, ranging from A1 to C2. On the other hand, there is a separate category for the domestic players. As expected, Niroshan Dickwella, Danushka Gunathilaka, and Kusal Mendis have been placed in the C2 category after they were banned for several months last year for breaking the bio-bubble restrictions during the tour of England.

The topmost category, A1 includes just the four players, Dimuth Karunaratne, Dhananjaya de Silva, Dushmantha Chameera, and Wanindu Hasaranga. While Chameera and Hasaranga have been a part of all the three formats, De Silva has been in and out of the limited-overs side despite being a regular in the Test line-up. Karunaratne is among the top Test batters going around in the world at the moment and the Sri Lankan Test skipper has been in the form of his life, scoring a century in India recently.

Here’s the list of centrally contracted players from Sri Lanka

A1 – Dimuth Karunaratne, Dhananjaya de Silva, Dushmantha Chameera, and Wanindu Hasaranga.

B1 – Pathum Nissanka, Lahiru Thirimanne, Dasun Shanaka, Dinesh Chandimal, Kusal Perera, Angelo Mathews.

B2 – Lasith Embuldeniya, Ramesh Mendis, Charith Asalanka

C1 – Vishwa Fernando, Avishka Fernando, Chamika Karunaratne.

Domestic Players – Praveen Jayawickrama, Oshada Fernando, Bhanuka Rajapaksa, Lakshan Sandakan, Maheesh Theekshana, Nuwan Pradeep, Binura Fernando, Lahiru Kumara, Minod Bhanuka, Kamindu Mendis.

C2 – Niroshan Dickwella, Danushka Gunathilaka, and Kusal Mendis.