Kenya's players finally reap financial rewards

Cricket Kenya has announced that Kenya's players will reap the rewards of their success in the World Cricket League with a $5000-a-man bonus.

Kenya's reward for winning the tournament was a lump sum of $250,000 from the ICC, as well as entry to the Twenty20 World Championship in South Africa in September. On top of that, Cricket Kenya recently signed a deal with Nimbus which will bring it in a guaranteed $150,000 a year.

Samir Inamdar, CK's chairman, told Cricinfo that this gave the board the opportunity to reward the players as well as to give them some medium-term security. "We will allocate $200,000 towards the players - and the $75,000 in bonuses will come out of that - and of the remaining money, $150,000 will be put towards development and the remaining $50,000 towards setting up a proper support system with CK."

The bonus to the players is the first since they reached the semi-finals of the 2003 World Cup. However, money promised at that time was not paid by the old Kenyan Cricket Association and that stand-off eventually led to the player strike in 2004. The World Cup bonuses were eventually cleared after the new board took over in 2005.

The board has been so short of money that players have been surviving on handouts and daily allowances, although the new money should result in most of them getting security for at least 12 months.

In addition to the prize-money and Nimbus money, Kenya also receives an allowance paid to all Associates of $70,000 and a high-performance allowance of $125,000.

Inamdar said that it was vital that the board found a sponsor in the coming months to enable the players to be given long-term security.