Sri Lanka's top cricketers, led by Test captain Dimuth Karunaratne and a host of seniors, including Dinesh Chandimal and Angelo Mathews, have refused to sign the central contracts offered by the board which they believe is far less compared to what the other countries offer.
If the dispute is not sorted out soon, it could affect Sri Lanka’s bilateral series against India in July, where six limited-over matches are expected to fill the coffers of the cash-strapped board of the island nation.
A statement from the attorney representing almost all the top players said that the remuneration proposed to the players is one third compared to a few other cricket-playing nations as per a Federation of International Cricket Association (FICA) report.
The SLC this week said that 24 of the top players had been offered contracts under four categories and had been time till June 3 to sign them.
Only six players are in Category A and their annual pay ranges between $70,000 to 100,000. Batsman Dhananjaya de Silva draws the highest — $100,000 — while the rest of them were to receive $70-80,000.
The Sri Lankan players said in a joint statement that they were “shocked and dismayed” by SLC's decision to go public with the payment details of the players.
