Indian Team vs Pakistan 2021 Cricket Team Salary Comparison

Pakistan players draw an annual salary that is almost equal to the monthly salary of top Indian Cricket Team players. 

It is that time of the year again when the Pakistan Cricket Board announces the annual salary compensation for the Pakistan Cricket team. Their cycle runs from July to June, and the compensation for the year 2021-22 was recently announced. 

A total of 20 cricketers (down from 21 last year) have been included in the contract list with players divided into the three major categories. Captain Babar Azam is included in the top category with the rest falling in Category B and Category C. There’s also an emerging category with three players in it. 

Pakistan Men Cricket Team Players Salary for 2021-22 (July-June): 

A Category (INR 8M): Babar Azam, Hasan Ali, Mohammad Rizwan & Shaheen Afridi

B Category (INR 5M): Azhar Ali, Faheem Ashraf, Fakhar Zaman, Fawad Alam, Shadab Khan & Yasir Shah

C Category (INR 4M): Abid Ali, Haris Rauf, Imam-ul-Haq, Mohammad Hasnain, Mohammad Nawaz, Nauman Ali & Sarfaraz Ahmed

Emerging Category:  Imran Butt, Shahnawaz Dahani & Usman Qadir

Analyzing closely, the category A players are the highest paid, but their annual compensation is meager ~INR 8M (USD 105K). This should not come as a surprise to many. The compensation drawn by their players annually is almost equal to the compensation drawn by the top 3 Indian players monthly. 

In total, PCB has awarded the contract to 20 players as compared to 28 from Team India. Pakistan are spending ~INR 90 Million on their players as annual compensation, which is almost equal to Virat Kohli’s annual compensation. In contrast, BCCI is spending INR 960 Million on its players annually. 

Indian Men Cricket Team Players Salary for 2020-21 (Oct-Sep):

A+ Grade (INR 70M): Jasprit Bumrah, Rohit Sharma & Virat Kohli

A Grade (INR 50M): Ajinkya Rahane, Cheteshwar Pujara, Hardik Pandya, Ishant Sharma, KL Rahul,  Mohammed Shami, Ravichandran Ashwin, Ravindra Jadeja, Rishabh Pant & Shikhar Dhawan

B Grade (INR 30M): Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Mayank Agarwal, Shardul Thakur, Umesh Yadav & Wriddhiman Saha

C Grade (INR 10M): Axar Patel, Deepak Chahar, Hanuma Vihari, Kuldeep Yadav, Mohd. Siraj, Navdeep Saini, Shreyas Iyer, Shubman Gill, Washington Sundar & Yuzvendra Chahal. 

Even the lowest category player, Category C draws an annual salary which is almost 1.25 times the annual salary of their highest category player. For example, Yuzvendra Chahal gets an annual compensation of INR 10M, whereas Babar Azam gets a compensation of INR 8M.

One of the strongest reasons for this is the amount of revenue generated by each board. BCCI as we all know is the richest board in the world. One of the main reasons for them being the richest is the Indian Premier League. BCCI generates billions of revenue from IPL, which can take care of not only players but also infrastructure.

Pakistan, meanwhile are in the rebuilding stage with hardly any action happening at home. With teams now starting to take active measures to play in Pakistan, we should see Pakistan generating more revenue in the coming years. Their T20 tournament, PSL too gaining more traction which should again help them get more revenue. In addition to the annual salary compensation, players from both teams get match fees and perks.

Conclusion:

Overall, Pakistan players may draw a salary that is quite nominal, comparing them with the Indian team players would not be a good idea as the situation for both the boards is completely different. With stringent security measures, Pakistan may see more influx of Cricket teams, which should only help them to give more salary to their players. 

Thanks for reading! Are you happy with the Indian and Pakistan Cricket Team salary? Please email your thoughts to business@cricalytics.com 

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Adesh Kothari

Adesh Kothari is the founder of AK4Tsay1 Cricalytics with over 20 years of experience following Cricket.

Cricket to him is like what Football is to Lionel Messi, Singing is to Lata Mangeshkar, Dancing is to Michael Jackson, and Acting is to Clint Eastwood.

Besides his effervescent love for Cricket, Adesh is an MBA by qualification.