Jamshedpur, Nov. 19: Jharkhand State Cricket Association (JSCA) today suspended 16 budding players, who were found to be overage in the age verification tests conducted by the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI).

The state body has slapped a three-year ban on the guilty cricketers, who would not be eligible to take part in any tournament conducted by the JSCA, said assistant secretary Aseem Kumar Singh.

The age verification tests were conducted by a BCCI team last month.

The Under-16 cricketers include Atul Chaitanya, Jitu Yadav, Kumar Utkarsh (Bokaro); Amit Kumar Sharma, Md Wamiq Alam, Nikhil Kumar Singh (Simdega); Hemant Kumar, Suran Pandey (Koderma); Rahul Anand (Lohardaga); Ram Kumar Singh, Satyam Law Kumar Singh (Gumla); Ravindra Verma (Giridih); Raushan Kumar Malakar (Chatra); Shashi Kumar (Jamtara); Shubham Rai (Ranchi) and Sudhir Kumar (Latehar).

"We strictly ask parents to not bring their over-aged wards for trials. But they don't seem to listen, forcing us to take stern action against the erring cricketers. The fault costs the players dear as they will not be able to perform for three years," a JSCA official said.

Currently, twenty eight probables are sweating it out at the Under-16 camp at Keenan Stadium in Jamshedpur. They will play a couple of friendly matches before selectors pick a 15-member squad for the Vijay Merchant Trophy.

Jharkhand will launch their campaign against Assam from December 1 to 3.