|| CF Correspondent ||

Bangladesh chief selector Minhajul Abedin said on Thursday that if they can have a strong core group of red-ball cricketers than they will develop as a cricket nation.

The Bangladesh Cricket Board has introduced a new system of different contracts for Test and limited-overs international players, effective from January 1.

BCB decided to adopt this system of central contracts that is followed by England, Australia, South Africa and West Indies splitting player contracts into red and white-ball contracts.

BCB also opted to increase match fees of cricketers after a gap of three years and put major emphasis on the match fees of the Test cricketers in order to inspire the youngster to play the longer format.

As per the latest plan, players who will represent Bangladesh in international cricket will get Tk 200,000 for a T20 match, Tk 300,000 for an ODI and Tk 600,000 for a Test.

Previously, the players were paid Tk 125,000 for T20I, Tk 200,000 for ODI and Tk 350,000 for Test.

Recently it was reported Bangladesh’s wicket-keeper batsman Mushfiqur Rahim is all set to be the highest paid cricketer in his country under the new pay structure designed by Bangladesh Cricket Board for their national contracted cricketers on the basis of points accumulated in the last three years.

BCB had recently decided to introduce white and red-ball contract for their national contracted cricketers for the 2020 season on the basis of points system.

A cricketer receives 8 points for playing each Test till 2017 while he received 10 points for the Tests he played in 2018 and 2019. A player got four and three points respectively for the ODIs and T20Is that he played till 2017 while for the last two years a cricketer received five and four points respectively for taking part in the ODIs.

 ‘’Point system was there before and it will be approved in board meeting than you will know,’’ Minhajul Abedin told reporters on Thursday.

‘’We put our recommendation to the disciplinary committee to bring players into red ball and white ball contracts who take part in all three formats or any specific formats and bring them into different contracts,’’ he said.

‘’Red ball is important for any Test-playing nation and if we have good red-ball cricketers than we are going to get other cricketers in different formats automatically,’’ he said.

‘’This is why we have increased the contract of red ball cricketers,’’ he said.