LAHORE: The Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) has announced to award central contract to 26 players here on Tuesday.

Moreover, Test match fee of the players included in the ‘A’ category of the central contract has been raised to Rs 350,000 and with that Shoaib Malik has been appointed captain of the national team for an indefinite period.

Chief operating officer PCB Saleem Altaf told at a news conference in Lahore that 26 players have been awarded central contract with raised fee in all three categories.

However, no change has been made in the perks of the players, he said.

Names of the players awarded central contract are given below:

Category ‘A’: Shoaib Malik, Shoaib Akhtar, Younus Khan, Danish Kaneria, Shahid Afridi, Kamran Akmal, Misbah-ul-Haq, Salman Butt, Umar Gul.

Category ‘B’: Yasir Hameed, Faisal Iqbal, Mohammad Hafeez, Sohail Tanveer.

Category ‘C’: Rao Iftikhar Anjum, Abdul Rehman, Yasir Arafat, Fawad Alam, Khurram Manzoor, Saeed Ajmal, Sohail Khan, Wahab Riaz, Samiullah Khan Niazi, Sarfaraz Ahmed, Nasir Jamshed, Umar Amin and Azhar Ali.

The players placed in ‘A’ category would get Rs 250,000 while the category ‘B’ players would be given Rs175,000 and the category ‘C’ players would be paid Rs 100,000.

Saleem Altaf told that chairman PCB Ijaz Butt has appointed Shoaib Malik as captain for an indefinite period by exercising his powers as the governing body is presently inactive in the absence of six technocrats.
He said that Justice Ejaz Yousuf, Aslam Sanjrani, Moeen Afzal, Lt Gen Muneer Hafeez, Ali Raza and Farooq Rehmat are not any part of the governing body.