21 Jul 2010

Four players lose Black Caps contracts

6:30 am on 21 July 2010

Four players - Neil Broom, Ian Butler, Daniel Flynn and James Franklin - have lost their New Zealand Cricket contracts, with the announcement of the 20 players contracted to the Black Caps for the next year.

Nathan McCullum, Andy McKay, BJ Watling and Kane Williamson are the newcomers while Scott Styris returns after controversially missing out on a contract last year.

Darryl Tuffey remains on the list after being reinstated frollowing the retirement of Iain O'Brien.

Twenty five players are ranked by the selectors on each format of the game, Test cricket, one dayers and Twenty20, with the 20 players with the highest aggregate score then offered contracts.

The Black Caps' next international assignment is a one day tri-series in Sri Lanka next month, which also involves India.

The contracted players are: Brent Arnel, Grant Elliott, Martin Guptill, Gareth Hopkins, Chris Martin, Brendon McCullum, Nathan McCullum, Tim McIntosh, Andy McKay, Kyle Mills, Jacob Oram, Jeetan Patel, Jesse Ryder, Tim Southee, Scott Styris, Ross Taylor, Daryl Tuffey, Daniel Vettori, BJ Watling, Kane Williamson.