Malan and Roy miss out on streamlined list of England central contracts

England have announced a pared-down list of central contracts for 2022-23 with only 18 players on the main list, down from 20 last year, and two mainstays of the white-ball side in recent years – Dawid Malan and Jason Roy – among those not on it. The total number of players given any sort of contract is, however, up from 27 to 30.

Roy’s demotion comes after a prolonged spell of poor form that extended across the English summer, during which he averaged 24.20 in ODIs and 19.04 in T20s and the Hundred, down from career averages of 40.34 and 27.97. In T20 appearances for England he scored just 78 runs in six innings.

Malan, meanwhile, had just broken back into the Test side when the last contracts were awarded, but has dropped out of it again this year and despite playing all three games on England’s trip to the Netherlands in June is not a first choice in the 50-over format. While both Malan and Roy have been awarded increment contracts, designed to top up the county deals of players on the fringe of the team, the Surrey opener Rory Burns, who has not been selected since the end of last winter’s Ashes series, drops off the list completely.

Ben Foakes, Burns’s county teammate who has come into the Test side since the appointments of Ben Stokes as captain and Brendon McCullum as coach, has earned his first central contract, and, with England mindful of the appeal of the full-time franchise circuit for one of the most sought-after white-ball players in world cricket, Liam Livingstone is also on the main list for the first time. The other player now without a deal is Eoin Morgan, who retired from international cricket in June.

The inclusion of Jofra Archer, who has not played for England in any format since March 2021 thanks