NZC releases contracted players

Black Caps General Manager Lindsay Crocker today released the twenty players to be offered New Zealand Cricket contracts for the year until May 31 2008.

The players are:

Shane Bond
Stephen Fleming
James Franklin
Peter Fulton
Mark Gillespie
Gareth Hopkins
Jamie How
Brendon McCullum
Craig McMillan
Hamish Marshall
Chris Martin
Michael Mason
Kyle Mills
Jacob Oram
Michael Papps
Jeetan Patel
Scott Styris
Ross Taylor
Daniel Vettori
Lou Vincent

The contracts were awarded to the players likely to be the most valuable to the Black Caps in the next 12 months.

Twenty five players are ranked by the selectors against set criteria in respect of Test cricket and 25 players are ranked by the selectors against set criteria in respect of ODI cricket.

There is a weighting of 1.25 for Test rankings and 1.00 for ODI rankings.

The 20 players with the highest aggregate score are then offered NZC contracts.

Gareth Hopkins and Mark Gillespie are the newcomers to the contracted players list while Craig McMillan has remained on the list after being reinstated last year following the retirement of Nathan Astle.

Mathew Sinclair and Andre Adams have missed out on contracts this year.

“Gareth has impressed enough as a wicketkeeper/batsman in both forms of the game to be awarded a contract,” Crocker said.

“Mark made the Black Caps last year after impressing as a New Zealand A player and has made sufficient advancement as a player to earn a contract.

“Players who have missed out on contracts can play their way into the Black Caps through domestic performances and can expect to pick up Major Association contracts,” he said.

New Zealand Cricket Media Release