Sri Lanka’s tour to England is in serious doubt after the players refused to sign the temporary tour contracts offered by Sri Lankan cricket. Although a provincial squad of 24 players were named for the series, it is learnt that each of those players and 14 others have refused to accept their tour contracts.

The Sri Lankan board and the players have been at loggerheads over the new annual contract propositions. The new Sri Lanka Cricket contract sees the base salary of players reduced with more emphasis on performance-based incentives. The number of contracts handed out were also cut from 30 to 24.

The changes were heralded by Director of Cricket Tom Moody and the technical committee that is headed by Aravinda de Silva.

“A thorough review of what was being practiced around the world was taken into consideration,” Moody said when the contracts were announced. “A lot of countries are trying to find what is the right process for them. This was not pulled out of thin air. This was done after thorough research – looking at other countries and their examples of how they contract their players. We put together what we thought was the best, most effective and fair system for Sri Lanka.”

The players, however, all 24 of them, refused to sign the contracts citing a lack of clarity and transparency on the categories in the contract.

Apparently, Sri Lankan Cricket has a player assessment model to judge the performance-based inventive, but the scores aren’t transparent to the players. The assessment is said to give weightage to performance, fitness and adaptability among other things.

Sri Lanka recently hit the headlines when head coach Mickey Arthur and a dropped player, Bhanuka Rajapaksa, got into a war of words in different interviews.

A statement raised by the attorney representing the players, the sum offered is nearly three times lower than what it used to be.

Since the contract wasn’t signed by June 3, the deadline given, the players were offered tour contracts, something that’s been in practice since the annual contracts expired last October. With the tour contracts, a further group of players have objected to the scheme with as many as 38 refusing to sign the contracts.

The tour is scheduled to begin on June 18 with a tour match against Kent followed by another against Sussex on June 20. The first T20I is set to be played on June 23.