Muttiah Muralitharan lashes out at senior players over SLC contracts dispute

Legendary spin bowler Muttiah Muralitharan has slammed four senior players of the national cricket team for the issues with the Sri Lanka Cricket (SLC) over the central contracts. Many of the national team players, which includes former skipper Angelo Mathews and Kusal Perera, have been in a tussle with the SLC over central contracts which the board offered.

Several of the Sri Lanka cricketers have refused to sign the contract with the board because of a pay dispute. However, despite these issues, the players agreed to sign a tour contract for the recent ODI and T20I series in England. Kusal Perera led the team on that tour. The issue due to which the Sri Lankan players didn’t agree to sign the central contract has been hinted at around the transparency issues.

We can go with tour contracts: Muttiah Muralitharan

Muralitharan has said that it was mainly the senior players who objected because the new guidelines meant lesser pay for the senior players. There was a new system introduced by the board and it was a performance-based system.

“This year we think they don’t need a central contract, we can go with tour contracts,” Murali told Hiru TV.

The cricketers have once again agreed to sign a tour contract for the series against India, which will start from July 18. The 49-year-old, who holds the record for the most number of wickets in Test cricket, said that senior players might have played a role in the young players not signing the contract.

Now that the players did not take it when it was offered by the board, Muralitharan said that they will not get central contracts. There are few players who are not part of the white-ball team and are suffering as the board decided to withdraw the offer for annual contracts. The issue was resolved slightly when the players agreed to sign just tour contracts that were offered.

In fact, some players agreed to sign the central annual contract as well but the board didn’t offer them. This entire move has put the Test cricketers at a loss as the players are not getting paid on a monthly basis now. There are no Test tours till November, which leaves the players of the longest format without a contract.