KARACHI, Nov 3: In the wake of the doping bans imposed on fast bowlers Shoaib Akhtar and Mohammad Asif, the Pakistan Cricket Board will conduct a review of central contracts awarded to players, an official said on Friday.

“The central contracts of Shoaib and Asif are automatically cancelled after they were banned,” said Saleem Altaf, director cricket operations.

“But we are also going to review the remaining contracts now,” he said, adding that the PCB would revise the contracts in line with its zero tolerance policy on doping.

The PCB awarded one-year contracts to 19 players before a tour of England in June, but the revised contracts would be given for the period January to June 2007.

Players in the top bracket receive a monthly salary of rupees 250,000 ($4,150) in addition to their base match fees and other incentives.

The drugs tribunal that conducted the inquiry into Akhtar and Asif found both had violated their contractual clauses.

He also indicated the new contracts would be awarded only to players who have played a minimum number of matches and would include incentive-based match fees.

“We are trying to curtail players' power in a methodical manner and we will try to adopt policies of other boards while awarding fresh contracts with added responsibility on players.”—Reuters