Reducing player workload, closing the pay gap: How Virat Kohli, MS Dhoni helped future generations

In his commentary on the functioning of the BCCI, Vinod Rai, the chairman of the four-member panel nominated by the Supreme Court to look after the administration of the BCCI during 2017-2019, narrates how former captains MS Dhoni and Virat Kohli suggested some generational reforms for Indian cricket.

'Not just a Nightwatchman - My innings in the BCCI', published by Rupa, details how the CoA reworked player contracts in 2017. Rai says upon the announcement of the revised contracts, "voices started to emerge" against the relatively low pay the cricketers still received. Ravi Shastri commented that the BCCI still "pays peanuts to its players".

Excerpts:

"I had an informal meeting with Virat Kohli and MS Dhoni at the ITC Maurya in Delhi on 31 October 2017, to better understand the issues that were agitating the minds of the cricketers. The meeting proved fruitful as the players opened up and were very cooperative in suggesting some remedial measures that needed to be taken.

On workload

"The first issue that came up was the workload the players were being made to take on. In 2016, they had played for about 232 days and it was taking a heavy toll on them. It emerged that while drawing up the Future Tours programme, the players had not been consulted. The IPL fixtures are high-intensity games involving travel between different venues and each team playing a minimum of 14 matches; thus the gap before and after the IPL games needed to be a minimum of a fortnight.

"The CoA held a formal meeting with the team management comprising Ravi Shastri, MS Dhoni and Virat Kohli on 30 November in New Delhi...Matches are increasingly scheduled with an eye on generating revenue for the host association rather than players' fatigue and well-being. This is inexcusable as players are the very people who make up the riches of the BCCI and causing player burn out is akin to 'killing the goose which lays the golden egg'. This issue was discussed at length and it was decided to provide a fortnight's gap before every foreign tour."

On pay structure

"The discussion then moved on to the annual player gradation and remuneration structure. The BCCI designates its contracted players into three categories: A, B and C. On this issue, Dhoni came up with an interesting proposition: there should be another category, A+, which should include players who play in all formats of the game.

"Another very commendable suggestion by Dhoni and Kohli was that the remuneration package for the more senior and better-known players was not so important, since they earn sufficient amounts from endorsements, and that it is the B and C category players who need to be compensated better as they do not have other sources of income. I really appreciated this spirit of speaking up for their other teammates. In light of this suggestion, we decided on a 'pyramid which was flat at the top'. In this structure, the gap between A and B categories would not be very wide and the B and C categories deserved a bigger hike to bring them closer to the remuneration package of the A category."