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NEW DELHI, Sunday (AFP)

India on Saturday put off naming their squad for next week's Champions Trophy in Sri Lanka, insisting the cricketers sign a sponsorship agreement first.

Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) president Jagmohan Dalmiya said the players had until Monday to sign the International Cricket Council (ICC) contract for the tournament starting in Colombo on Thursday.

"The selection committee will meet in Calcutta on September 9 to pick the best available team," Dalmiya told reporters after a four-hour emergency meeting of the board's top officials.

"The players will have to sign the contract with a 30-day clause for the tournament and only those signing it will be selected," he said.

Indian cricketers had initially objected to the clause which prevented them from endorsing products that are in conflict with those of the official sponsors a month after the ICC-conducted tournament.

The ICC had reduced the period to 16 days in a bid to resolve the sponsorship crisis following an agreement reached between the sport's world governing body and the Indian players in London on Friday.

"The 30-day exclusion period after the tournament has been reduced to 16 days which is the day before the start of India's second Test against the West Indies," ICC chief executive Malcolm Speed said in a statement.

But Dalmiya said the cricketers would have to sign the 30-day clause because the Indian board had not received an undertaking by other countries that no future compensation claim could be made against the BCCI by anyone in relation to the Champions Trophy.

"The Indian board will compensate its players if they suffer financial losses because of the 30-day clause. "Since the Indian board has not been given any assurance, a tournament sponsor may later demand compensation for losses due to the ICC's decision to limit the conflict advertising to 16 days after the tournament.

"We would prefer paying our own players compensation for the losses rather than be asked to pay a fine at a later point of time," said Dalmiya.

The ICC said Friday it had resolved the dispute with the Indian players - pending the agreement of one official sponsor - and it was now up to the Indian board to decide whether it wanted its best players to represent the country.

Dalmiya said this issue had also been resolved as the fourth sponsor, South African Airways, was not interested in using images of foreign cricketers.

"Three of the four tournament sponsors have given it in writing that they will not call the Indian players for imaging," he said.

"The other sponsor, South African Airways, has said it is not interested in players of countries other than South Africa. Thus, this issue has been resolved."

Dalmiya denied he had rejected the agreement between the ICC and the Indian players, saying he was only repeating an earlier offer.

"It's not a question of rejecting the agreement between the ICC and the players. I'm only stressing that our offer is better. Only, this time, the deadline (for naming the team) can't be extended," he said.

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