Cricket Australia (CA) on Thursday released the new list of centrally contracted players ahead of a power-packed 2023/24 season which includes the Ashes, World Test Championship and ICC ODI World Cup. While uncapped Lance Morris has been handed his first contract by the CA, spinner Todd Murphy also bagged his maiden national contract after his sensational performance in the recently concluded Border Gavaskar Trophy (BGT) 2023.
On the other hand, Sean Abbott, Michael Neser and Jhye Richardson have all earned fresh contracts too. The popular names to miss out from the contract list include the likes of Matthew Renshaw and Peter Handscomb. Meanwhile, Marcus Harris has returned to the list released by CA.
Considering the busy season, the Australian selectors took the call to fill up the four additional spots available under the new Memorandum of Understanding and expanded the list to 24 players. Speaking about the new memorandum, National Selection Panel (NSP) chair George Bailey said the decision had been taken keeping in mind the big events that lie ahead.
“There has been some outstanding individual and team performances through the past 12 months. Equally, we have been extremely impressed with the emergence of some players who are knocking on the door of Australian selection across all three formats. Two huge challenges in the Test arena in The World Test Championship and the Ashes are on our doorstep followed soon after by the ICC One-Day World Cup,” Bailey was quoted saying by cricket.com.au.
“We have chosen a group of players we expect will form the majority of those two campaigns and we know that we will need a squad mentality to achieve success,” he added.
Cricket Australia men’s contract list 2023-24: Sean Abbott, Ashton Agar, Scott Boland, Alex Carey, Pat Cummins, Cameron Green, Marcus Harris, Josh Hazlewood, Travis Head, Josh Inglis, Usman Khawaja, Marnus Labuschagne, Nathan Lyon, Mitchell Marsh, Glenn Maxwell, Lance Morris, Todd Murphy, Michael Neser, Jhye Richardson, Steve Smith, Mitchell Starc, Marcus Stoinis, David Warner, Adam Zampa.
