Axar Patel, Kuldeep Yadav, Shreyas Iyer Receive Support As Fans Slam BCCI For Their Central Contract Grades

The BCCI announced the men's central contracts for the 2024-25 season on April 21, 2025. ,The BCCI revealed 34 names of players who received full-time contracts for Team India across formats.

While Shreyas Iyer and Ishan Kishan rejoined the BCCI, Rohit Sharma and Virat Kohli were kept in Grade A+. Jasprit Bumrah and Ravindra Jadeja were both kept in the highest grade.

Shreyas Iyer, Kuldeep Yadav, Axar Patel, Yashasvi Jaiswal, and Suryakumar Yadav were all assigned to Group B, while Rishabh Pant was promoted from Grade B to A. New hires in Grade C include Varun Chakravarthy, Abhishek Sharma, Sarfaraz Khan, Akash Deep, Dhruv Jurel, Nitish Kumar Reddy, and Harshit Rana.

The Grade C list, the lowest of the retainers, included Shardul Thakur, KS Bharat, Avesh Khan, and Jitesh Sharma from the prior year. All four have been left out.

Ishan Kishan and Shreyas Iyer’s inclusion was welcomed as they were excluded by the BCCI in the previous list due to their refusal to play domestic cricket despite the Indian team management’s wishes.

BCCI not promoting Axar Patel, Kuldeep Yadav, and Shreyas Iyer receives backlash from the fans

Players like Axar Patel, Shreyas Iyer, and Kuldeep Yadav have been instrumental for the Indian team in the last year. Axar and Kuldeep were the stars in India’s T20 World Cup 2024 win, while Shreyas Iyer top-scored for India in their ICC Champions Trophy 2025 win.

The fans were not able to digest that Axar, Kuldeep, and Iyer were not promoted to Grade A for their contributions, while Rishabh Pant received a promotion despite his poor performances across formats for India in the last year.

In addition to being important players for India, supporters believe they should have been given Grade A central contracts because of the trio's contributions to India's victories in the ICC T20 World Cup 2024 and the ICC Champions Trophy 2025.

Here are the posts:

- Rishabh Pant is in Grade A.

- Suryakumar Yadav, Yashasvi Jaiswal & Shreyas Iyer are in Grade B.

What are BCCI officials smoking?

— Incognito (@Incognito_qfs) April 21, 2025

2 clutch Players who won us CT are in Grade B #ShreyasIyer and #AxarPatel Deserved better 💔
BCCI ki mkc pic.twitter.com/8KCbIa3Z1z

— Aryan. (@mishraa2505) April 21, 2025

Tukka players like Siraj, Pant & Gill getting Grade A, meanwhile Captain Surya, 3 format Best player Jaiswal & Mr Dependables Axar & Iyer getting Grade C.@BCCI is high on something.#ShreyasIyer #AxarPatel #YashasviJaiswal #Cricket #IPL

— PIYUSH PAWAR (@im_piyushpawar) April 21, 2025

Axar Patel should get A grade instead of Pant, Pant only plays test matches and sits as replacement in ODIs and t20is even though he doesn't perform in Whiteball

— Hi Hello (@HiHello394592) April 21, 2025

Why is Axar Patel in GradeB and Arshdeep in Grade C in BCCI central contract?? Atleast Axar deserves to be in Grade A and Arshdeep deserves GradeB and then you put Jadeja in A+...wtf @BCCI ?? What's d logic 🤔?? @lonsaikia @ShuklaRajiv @imAagarkar plz rethink 🙏… pic.twitter.com/yK43shlxTf

— Dipanjan Chatterjee (@I_am_DipCh) April 21, 2025

Axar Patel should have been in A or A+, considering his contribution in last few years both with bat and bowl

— Ajax (@Ajaxjacksss) April 21, 2025

Axar Patel being all format all rounder player is Grade B

Daylight robbery for DC Skipper !!

— Virat (@virat_stark) April 21, 2025

How the hell Axar Patel is in Grade C ? He's a three format player.

Same question for Rohit, Kohli and Jadeja. This doesn't make sense at all. https://t.co/9HvZzNUDYP

— Omkar Shrimali (@OmkarShrimali) April 21, 2025

Axar patel and Shreyas Iyer
Grade B nhi Grade A hona chahiye pic.twitter.com/23ojxFny5X

— Raja Babu (@GaurangBhardwa1) April 21, 2025

big achievement for them, well deserved

— sehrish qayyum (@sehrishqayyum2) April 21, 2025

Shreyas and Ishan Kishan deserve this.

— Diva (@Diva4259) April 21, 2025

They both deserved for this #ShreyasIyer #ishankishan

— ☬ 𝐁𝐥𝐚𝐜𝐤𝐖𝐢𝐝𝐨𝐰 ☬ (@Black_Widow1805) April 21, 2025

Shreyas Iyer & Ishan Kishan are back on the BCCI central contracts list! Iyer’s 2025 Champions Trophy heroics & Kishan’s domestic grind paid off. BCCI rules (3 Tests/8 ODIs/10 T20Is) likely sealed their return. Big win for consistency! #BCCI #TeamIndia pic.twitter.com/2nVgy6fZ0U

— Bliss Breeze 🕊️ (@BlissBreeze_) April 21, 2025

Big moment for Shreyas Iyer, Ishan kishan, NKR, Dhruv Jurel, Sarfaraz khan, Abhishek Sharma & Harshit Rana.

-Comeback for Iyer & Ishan

— Rohit Baliyan (@rohit_balyan) April 21, 2025

#ishankishan Ishan kishan is back in the BCCI central contact list . What is surprising is that shreyas iyer is in Grade B whereas mohd siraj is in Grade A .#Ris pic.twitter.com/dyJcoSH7qT

— Omnipresent (@Invisible0904) April 21, 2025