Pune and Rajkot shell out Rs 39 cr each in IPL draft

The draft process saw 10 players from the pool of 50 picked up by the two new franchises with five domestic and five international capped players finding a new IPL home

For the first time since the Indian Premier League kicked off in 2008, Suresh Raina and M S Dhoni will play against each other for Rajkot and Pune respectively. The two players, who were with Chennai Super Kings for all the eight seasons for the cash rich Twenty-20 tournament till now, will be playing  after the first ever Vivo IPL player draft on Tuesday.

The two teams shelled out Rs 39 crore each to acquire five players. While Sanjeev Goenka’s Pune team picked up M S Dhoni, Ajinkya Rahane, R Ashwin, Steven Smith and Faf du Plessis, Intex-owned Rajkot franchise has Raina, Ravindra Jadeja, Brendon McCullum, James Faulkner and Dwayne Bravo in its player kitty (see chart).

Unlike an auction, where the players are allotted a base or reserve price and then are subjected to bidding by the participating teams, a draft has a fixed price. The draft process entails the teams taking turns in picking players from a pool. The Pune team, having the lowest bid in the franchise bidding process, went about picking first during the draft.

The player draft, which took place at the Mumbai Cricket Association in Mumbai, saw 50 players from the two suspended teams – Chennai Super Kings and Rajasthan Royals, up for grabs. The two new teams are now at a par with the existing franchises in the IPL who can retain up to five players from the 2015 squad. The existing teams are yet to announce the retained players for their respective squads.

“Our intent is to put together a really strong team to ensure a thrilling tournament for the fans. I am very happy with the players that we have been able to fix today as they are amongst the best talents in the sports. Being a new team we will inject new ideas and hopefully add lots of excitement to the upcoming season,” stated Keshav Bansal, owner, Rajkot IPL Team and Director, Intex Technologies.

According to the IPL auction rules for existing teams, the first player retained costs Rs 12.5 crore, the second players costs Rs 9.5 crore, third player comes at Rs 7.5 crore, the fourth player at Rs 5.5 crore and the fifth player at Rs 4 crore. In order to retain five players, a team would end up spending Rs 39 crore. The rest of the money is usede to acquire players in the annual IPL auction. This year, the total salary purse available to the teams is Rs 66 crore, Rs 3 crore more than 2015’s Rs 63 crore.

The two new teams will join the existing six franchises for the annual IPL auction that will be held on February 6 next year.