Thiruvananthapuram, May 17: In his first response to the drama that he is now entangled in, S. Sreesanth has admitted to his involvement in the spot-fixing incident. 
Talking to reporters of Malayalam TV channels outside the court where he and others were produced, he said tersely, “It is my mistake,” before being whisked away.
New Delhi, Jan 16: Veteran cricketer Mithali Raj was on Thursday demoted to Grade B from A in the BCCI central contracts while Radha Yadav and Taniya Bhatia were elevated to the middle bracket.
Mithali not being kept in the Rs 50 lakh category was expected as the 37-year-old retired from T20s in September last year. However, she remains the ODI captain and plans to carry on till the 2021 World Cup.
T20 skipper Harmanpreet Kaur retained his A category contract alongside Smriti Mandhana and Poonam Yadav.
Radha and Taniya, who both had a Grade C contract worth Rs 10 lakh last year, have now entered Grade B (Rs 30 lakh).
Players getting a central contract for the first time are 15-year-old opener Shafali Verma and Harleen Deol, who like the teenager is an attacking batter.
Shafali has attracted a lot of attention ever since making her India debut last year. She recently made 124 against Australia A in Brisbane. The opener will be expected to deliver in the upcoming T20 World Cup Down Under.
Dropped from the list is Mona Meshram, who was in Grade C last year and hasn't played a single game in recent times.
The latest contracts run from October 2019 to September 2020.
Grade A (Rs 50 lakh): Harmanpreet Kaur, Smriti Mandhana, Poonam Yadav.
Grade B (Rs 30 lakh): Mithali Raj, Jhulan Goswami, Ekta Bisht, Radha Yadav, Taniya Bhatia, Shikha Pandey, Jemimah Rodrigues, Deepti Sharma.
Grade C (Rs 10 lakh): Veda Krishnamurthy, Punam Raut, Anuja Patil, Mansi Joshi, D Hemlatha, Arundhati Reddy, Rajeshwari Gayakwad, Pooja Vastrakar, Harleen Deol, Priya Punia, Shafali Verma.
New Delhi, Jul 12: Former India batsman Sachin Tendulkar has urged the International Cricket Council (ICC) to do away with 'umpire's call' whenever a team opts for a review regarding a leg-before wicket (LBW) decision.
The Master Blaster has also said that a batsman should be given out if the ball is hitting the stumps.
Whether more than 50 per cent of the ball is hitting the stumps or not should not be matter, he further stated.
"What per cent of the ball hits the stumps doesn't matter, if DRS shows us that the ball is hitting the stumps, it should be given out, regardless of the on-field call," Tendulkar tweeted.
With this tweet, the former India batsman also shared a video, in which he has a discussion with Brian Lara regarding the working of DRS.
"One thing I don't agree with, with the ICC, is the DRS they have been using for quite some time. It is the LBW decision where more than 50 per cent of the ball must be hitting the stumps for the on-field decision to be overturned," Tendulkar said in the video.
"The only reason they (the batsman or the bowler) have gone upstairs is that they are unhappy with the on-field decision, so when the decision goes to the third umpire, let the technology take over, just like in tennis, it's either in or out, there's nothing in between," he added.
This call for doing away with umpire's call has been recommended by many former players.
Whenever a verdict pops up as 'umpire's call, the decision of the on-field umpire is not changed, but the teams do not lose their review as well.
ICC recently introduced some changes to the game of cricket, and they gave all teams liberty of extra review as non-neutral umpires will be employed in Test matches due to the coronavirus pandemic.
As a result, all teams will now have three reviews in every innings of a Test match.
Karachi, Mar 26: Pakistan's centrally-contracted cricketers will contribute Rs 5 million to the national government's emergency fund to combat the COVID-19 pandemic.
Pakistan Cricket Board Chairman Ehsan Mani on Wednesday said apart from centrally-contracted players contributing Rs 5 million, the employees in the board, up to the senior manager level, will contribute their one day's salary.
Those employed as general managers or on higher posts will give two days' salary to the fund.
"The PCB will collect all these funds and deposit it to the government's coronavirus fund," he said.
Pakistan has recorded more than 1,000 positive cases of the deadly virus, which has claimed more than 19,000 lives all over the world.
"It is the history of the cricket board that we always stand by the government in difficult times," Mani said.
The PCB has already given its high performances centre in Karachi at the national stadium to be used by paramedical staff working at the special coronavirus hospital set up at the expo centre in the in the city.
Mani said though cricket has been disrupted by the virus outbreak but it was far more important for the nation to stand by the government and also take all precautionary steps during the pandemic.
Pakistan's centrally-contracted players are entitled to monthly salaries ranging from Rs 5 to 12 lakh besides match fee and other earnings.
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