Bangladesh’s domestic cricketers will get a much better match fee after the Bangladesh Cricket Board has upped the ante for both male and female players.
The move comes as players have been worried about the return of their wages, especially after the BPL was postponed. The absence of BPL this year has led the BCB to implement the new payment system to give the domestic players more financial stability during the season.
In the case of men’s cricket, the match fee has increased from Tk 70,000 to Tk 1.5 lakh for the first-class matches. The players taking part in List A cricket will now be paid Tk 1 lakh for each match, which is double from Tk 50,000, while the domestic T20 will be paid Tk 80,000, which is also double from Tk 40,000.
The women’s domestic cricket has also been given a nice boost. The match fee for the four day match is Tk 40,000, which was Tk 20,000 earlier. One-day fees have been raised to Tk 30,000, and the pay of T20 players has been upped from Tk 10,000 to Tk 20,000 per game.
BCB president Tamim Iqbal stated the board had wanted to find a solution that would be more permanent rather than just be the matter of compensating the players for the financial blow of the BPL postponement. He noted that domestic competitions would allow opportunities for a much larger group of people than the franchise tournament, which has a relatively small number of local players.
Some of the calculations made by Tamim are as follows: if a player finishes his full domestic season, he can earn about Tk 35 lakh to Tk 40 lakh a year along with salary. This would be equivalent to an average earning of over Tk 3 lakh per month.
But greater expectations will accompany greater financial support. The BCB will be more stringent on professionalism, especially in terms of fitness requirements, Tamim emphasized. The board president said it doesn’t provide special consideration to players who do not meet the pre-season fitness requirements.
The BCB is also mulling changes to the way some domestic competitions are funded. The board is thinking about a commercial model for the four-day and one-day tournaments of the Bangladesh Cricket League, as well as the National Cricket League’s tourney in T20 cricket, rather than taking the full burden.
The proposed format would see the three tournaments wrapped up in a single commercial package, and also would involve six private teams, with approximately 60 days allowed for the whole competition.
The traditional 8 teams National Cricket League 4 day championship is likely to stay the same with divisions. The NCL 2nd XI will also be ongoing for 3 days.
The higher match fees are a major shift for the country’s domestic players, and may alleviate the financial burden on players who don’t play in the BPL.
