Usman Khawaja and Shaun Marsh: Ex-IPL stars excluded from CA's central contracts list

Usman Khawaja and Shaun Marsh were among the big names who were omitted from the latest Cricket Australia contracts for 2020/21. The board announced its contract list for the next year and players like Marnus Labuschagne, Joe Burns, Matthew Wade and Mitchell Marsh earned themselves new contracts. Here is the full list along with chief selector Trevor Hohns' insights on Usman Khawaja's omission.

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Usman Khawaja, Shaun Marsh miss out on Cricket Australia national contract

The following players have received a Cricket Australia national contract for 2020/21:

Ashton Agar, Joe Burns, Alex Carey, Pat Cummins, Aaron Finch (ODI captain), Josh Hazlewood, Travis Head, Marnus Labuschagne, Nathan Lyon, Mitchell Marsh, Glenn Maxwell, Tim Paine (Test captain), James Pattinson, Jhye Richardson, Kane Richardson, Steve Smith, Mitchell Starc, Matthew Wade, David Warner, and Adam Zampa.

Players that were omitted in the list were:

Usman Khawaja, Nathan Coulter-Nile, Peter Handscomb, Marcus Harris, Shaun Marsh and Marcus Stoinis.

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Trevor Hohns reveals reason for Usman Khawaja omission

In a report by ABC Australia, Cricket Australia's chief selector Trevor Hohns was quoted to have said: "Usman didn't play cricket for Australia last year at all in any format after being dropped from the Ashes series and probably if I'm looking at Test cricket, Usman's form in domestic Shield cricket didn't demand that he was chosen for Australia."

Khawaja suffered from poor form in the 2019 Ashes and was dropped during the series. He has not played a match for Australia since then. It is believed that many Australian cricket pundits that his argument with the team's head coach Justin Langer shown in The Test documentary, played a major role in Khawaja going out of favour despite having a good World Cup and 2018-19 season prior to that.

However, Usman Khawaja's form in Shield cricket was indeed not very impressive either and in the Big Bash, he played 17 matches and only scored 388 runs for the Sydney Thunder. Usman Khawaja's last IPL stint came all the way back in 2016 when he played for the erstwhile Rising Pune Supergiant under MS Dhoni.

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Shaun Marsh's ODI career all but over

Another big omission was Shaun Marsh. The 37-year-old served as a good replacement in the top-order for David Warner and Steve Smith but Marsh has not played a match for the Australian ODI side since breaking his arm at the 2019 World Cup. His age and frequent injuries could also be a reason behind him not winning a central contract.

However, Shaun Marsh had a brilliant Shield season and was in good touch for the Melbourne Renegades in the BBL. He scored 449 runs in 12 Big Bash League innings. Marsh was dropped by the Kings XI Punjab ahead of IPL 2018 after playing 10 seasons for the team. The 2008 Orange Cap winner has not been picked by any IPL team since then.

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