The 13th installment of the league was scheduled to begin on March 29, but was pushed to April 15, with the coronavirus outbreak shutting down all operations in nations across the world.

With India currently in the middle of a 21-day lockdown that may or may not end on April 14, a start at the revised date is already ruled out, which makes it highly unlikely to accommodate a full season within the Indian summer.

With the Board of Control for Cricket in India potentially facing losses to the tune of INR 2000 crore (£215 million approx), implementing cuts to player salaries might be inevitable. “Obviously, if the organisation takes a financial hit, the salaries of employees get affected as well,” a BCCI official was quoted as saying by the newspaper.

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India’s contracts system is graded into four categories. A-plus constitutes the highest earning group, comprising Virat Kohli, Jasprit Bumrah and Rohit Sharma, who each draw INR 7 crore per annum. Category A, featuring R Ashwin, Mohammed Shami, Cheteshwar Pujara, KL Rahul and Ajinkya Rahane, comes with an annual retainership of INR 5 crore. Category B, with an income of INR 3 crore, consists of Hardik Pandya, Mayank Agarwal, among others, while the last category, C, which carries an annual retainership of INR 1 crore, has among others Shreyas Iyer and Hanuma Vihari. MS Dhoni is not a part of the contracts system, after he was dropped from the list for the new season.

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Apart from the contracts, international players receive match fees of INR 15 lakh per Test, 7 lakh per ODI and 5 lakh per T20I. Domestic players earn 35,000 for each day of a first-class game, and 50,000 each for a one-day and T20 game.

Per the board’s revenue distribution system, 26% of the board’s annual income is reserved for the players, with international players receiving a 13% share, while the rest is distributed among domestic and junior team players.

“In case of revenue loss for the BCCI due to no IPL,” a board source said, “the international players’ income will exceed their entitled share in the board income.”