A whopping 1,097 cricketers have registered their names in a big to be picked at the mini-auction for the 14th edition of the Indian Premier League (IPL) which will take place in Chennai on February 18. Out of these, these maximum number of overseas cricketers are from West Indies – 56 – while the second most from the foreign shores are 42 from Australia.
Among these 1097 players, 207 are capped players while 863 are uncapped and 27 are from Associate nations. Former India paceman Shanthakumaran Sreesanth is among the 207 capped players who have registered for the auction. Sreesanth has returned to domestic cricket after Supreme Court lifted his life ban for spot-fixing in IPL. Australian paceman Mitchell Starc has not registered his name for the auction this year.
“The IPL Player Registration closed on 4th February, 2021 with 1097 players (814 Indian and 283 overseas players) signing up to be a part of the IPL 2021 Player Auction set to take place in Chennai on 18th February. The auction will begin from 3pm onwards,” a BCCI release stated.
“The players list incorporates 207 capped, 863 uncapped and 27 Associate players. The detailed list is: capped Indian (21 players), capped International (186 players), Associate (27 players), Uncapped Indian players who have played at least 1 IPL match (50 players), Overseas uncapped players who have played at least 1 IPL match (2 players), Uncapped Indians (743 players) and Uncapped International (68 players),” the release added.
If every franchise were to have the maximum of 25 players in their squad, 61 players will be taken in the auction (of which up to 22 may be overseas players).
Meanwhile, in a bid to strengthen their middle-order, Chennai Super Kings showed faith on former India batsman Suresh Raina as the Uttar Pradesh cricketer was retained by the franchise. However, veteran off-spinner Harbhajan Singh, along with Kedar Jadhav, Murali Vijay, Piysuh Chawla, and Shane Watson were let go by CSK.
Apart from Royal Challengers Bangalore and Kings XI Punjab, the remaining franchises have retained their core unit and will now try and fill up the gaps keeping the future in mind.
Here’s the remaining purse for all eight franchises:
Chennai Super Kings: Rs 22.9 crore
Royal Challengers Bangalore: Rs 35.7 crore
Rajasthan Royals: Rs 34.85 crore
Kings XI Punjab: Rs 53.2 crore
Mumbai Indians: Rs 15.35 crore
Sunrisers Hyderabad: Rs 10.75 crore
Kolkata Knight Riders: Rs 10.85 crore
Delhi Capitals: Rs 9 crore
Some big names that would be up for grabs at the upcoming auction are as follow:
Kedar Jadhav, Murali Vijay, Piyush Chawla, Monu Singh, Alex Carey, Keemo Paul, Tushar Deshpande, Sandeep Lamichhane, Mohit Sharma, Jason Roy, Glenn Maxwell, Sheldon Cottrell, Mujeeb Zadran, Hardus Viljoen, James Neesham, Krishnappa Gowtham, Karun Nair, Jagadeesha Suchith, Tejinder Singh Dhillon, Chris Green, Harry Gurney, M Siddharth, Nikhil Naik, Siddhesh Lad, Tom Banton, Prince Balwant Rai, Digvijay Deshmukh, Nathan Coulter-Nile, James Pattinson, Sherfane Rutherford, Mitchell McCleneghan, Steve Smith, Akash Singh, Anirudha Joshi, Ankit Rajpoot, Oshane Thomas, Shashank Singh, Tom Curran, Varun Aaron, Chris Morris, Shivam Dube, Aaron Finch, Umesh Yadav, Moeen Ali, Parthiv Patel, Pawan Negi, Isuru Udana, Gurkeerat Mann, Billy Stanlake, Sandeep Bavanaka, Fabian Allen, Sanjay Yadav and Prithviraj Yarra.
