Punjab Cricket Association reach out to Yuvraj Singh, requesting him to reconsider retirement and play for Punjab

Punjab Cricket Association secretary Puneet Bali has requested former Indian stalwart and Punjab Cricketer Yuvraj Singh to reconsider retirement from all forms of Cricket and play for Punjab again in the upcoming domestic Cricket season.

So far, there has been no news of Yuvraj committing on the same to the PCA, and will require the BCCI’s permission to take up the offer. The Punjab Cricket team have plenty of young members in their roster now that few of their most experienced campaigners have migrated to different teams. Manan Vohra and Barinder Sran moved to Chandigarh two seasons ago on account of being local Cricketers, and Jiwanjot Singh and Taruwar Kohli moved to Chhattisgarh and Meghalaya respectively.

Bali hopes that the rebuild with the youngsters requires Yuvraj’s experience and mentoring. He told ESPNCricinfo, “These boys were all undergoing sessions with our physios and trainers to prepare (for the season),” Bali told ESPNcricinfo. “Yuvraj initiated sessions with these boys while he was in Chandigarh. Over the last couple of seasons, we’ve lost players to other states, many of our players to Chandigarh, Chhattisgarh and Himachal. So we felt a player of Yuvraj’s experience and calibre could lend a lot of value and inspire the youngsters.

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“The request I made was for him to consider playing all formats. But if he comes back to and says, he’s available only for limited-overs cricket, for some reason, that will be fine too. I’m looking forward to hear from him soon. But as such, he’s been working hard with the boys.”

However, coming back from retirement may not be so straightforward. BCCI considers players to have officially retired to provide NOCs for overseas leagues. And Yuvraj has featured in two such tournaments in the past year, the Global T20 Canada and Abu Dhabi T10 League.

Last month, Yuvraj spent time overseeing closed-door training sessions of Shubman Gill, Prabhsimran Singh, Anmolpreet Singh, Abhishek Sharma and Harpreet Brar, all of whom are set to feature in this year’s IPL, at PCA’s upcoming international stadium in Mullanpur, near Chandigarh.

A sight that might soon be witnessed again

In another key development, the PCA is also set to offer state contracts to their players. Bali confirmed the contracts list has been drawn up and will likely come into force from October 1, 2020. The contracts for this season will go up to April 30, 2021.

The men’s category will have three grades: A, B and C. Grade A will come with a retainer of INR 8 lakh, B with a retainer of INR 6 lakh, and those in C, mostly for Under-19s and promising age-group talent, will get a retainer of INR 10,000 rupees a month. There will be 10 players in each of the contract grades.

Players for Grades A and B will be considered based on seniority. Those in A need to fulfil the criteria of having played for Punjab in the previous Ranji Trophy season. However, exceptions will be made for those who have either represented India, India A or India Under-19 in the same period. “Essentially, we want to reward those who’ve performed in the Ranji Trophy, so that is first criteria,” Bali explained.

The women’s contracts too will be divided into three, and will be valued similarly to the men’s. However, the number of players offered contracts will vary, with Groups A and B having three members each, while four players will be awarded Group C contracts.

Bali said, “We had a discussion in November last year, and then February, and then things came to a standstill due to the pandemic, but we’ve more or less formalised it now. The men’s list has been drawn up. We’re waiting for our women’s squads to be picked before finalising the contracts in that category.”