The England & Wales Cricket Board (ECB) has announced the names of the 11 players who are being offered central contracts for the coming summer. Jamie Foster, the young Essex wicketkeeper, has been offered a contract, which means there is no room for Alec Stewart, who opted out of the recent tour of India. David Graveney, England's chairman of selectors, stressed that this did not mean that Stewart's distinguished Test career was over. "We have been very happy with James's efforts over the winter. The situation has been explained to Alec and I can confirm that he will not be excluded from future discussions regarding Team selection." Stewart, who has played in 115 Tests, turned 39 two days ago.

There is also no place for Craig White, who was one of the centrally contracted players last year. White lost form and confidence over the winter, and he is joined on the sidelines by Mark Ramprakash, who occupied a middle-order place in all six Tests this winter without scoring more than 58 in an innings.

The 11, who would form a ready-made team, are:

Marcus Trescothick
Michael Vaughan
Mark Butcher
Nasser Hussain capt
Graham Thorpe
Andrew Flintoff
James Foster wk
Ashley Giles
Andrew Caddick
Darren Gough
Matthew Hoggard

Graveney explained: "The selectors understand that budget constraints mean that ECB cannot grant more than 12 Test contracts for the forthcoming summer. However, we are finding it increasingly difficult to maintain the consistency of selection and the improved team ethos that we have achieved over the last couple of years working within this constraint and we are keen to see an increase in the number of contracted players as soon as possible.

"The purpose of the naming of 11 players at this stage is to assist the counties in their early-season preparations and to fulfil the head coach's wishes for certain players to rest after this winter's commitments. Both Duncan Fletcher and I look forward to meeting senior representatives of the ECB to discuss our aspirations for the future with regard to the contracting system."

John Carr, the ECB's director of cricket operations, said: "The Board fully understands the selectors' desire to move to the central contracting of a larger squad of England players and at its forthcoming meeting the International Teams Management Group is scheduled to be fine-tuning a paper recommending this change for implementation from September 2002. The paper is due to be presented to the ECB's First Class Forum on 13 May."

The ECB explained that those players who had been involved in both the Test and one-day squads during the winter - Hussain, Trescothick, Vaughan, Thorpe, Flintoff, Foster, Caddick, Hoggard and Giles - will be available to play for their Counties in the final two Benson & Hedges Cup group games and the Frizzell County Championship matches that start on May 8.

Those contracted players who were involved in only the Test or ODI squads during the winter, namely Gough and Butcher, will be available to play for their counties from the beginning of the season.

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