MUMBAI: The inaugural edition of the Premier Handball League concluded its auction process with 116 players, including international, India internationals and domestic handball talent up for selection by the six franchises.
All 18 international players in the fray, representing the Asian Handball Federation amongst other federations, were picked up among the six teams. Each team was allowed to only select one foreign right-back, left-back and goalkeeper respectively. In terms of the biggest foreign imports, Telugu Talons went for the services of Andrei Igorevich Nedbailo (goalkeeper) from Russia – a six-time Russian champion. Garvit Gujarat picked up Tuliboev Mukhtor (right back) from Uzbekistan. The 24-year-old is known for his exploits with the Uzbek team at the Interamnia World Cup wherein they clinched gold. Golden Eagles Uttar Pradesh went all out to secure the services of Iran’s Omid Reza (goalkeeper), who has represented his country in the IHF Handball World Cup in the last two World Cup editions. Maharashtra Ironmen secured the services of Iran’s right back Jalal Kiani. Kiani is a Silver medallist with the national team at the Asian Games. Delhi Panzers went for the 20-year-old Artem Martynov (right back) from Russia, a 2019 Russian Handball Championship gold medallist. Lastly, it was the Rajasthan Team (yet to be named) who selected the services of Iraq’s left-back Baderaladeen Naser.
The second category was reserved for Indian star players and 42 players were up for selection by the franchises.
Under this category, each team was allowed to pick only one player for each of the seven positions i.e. right back, left back, centre back, right wing, left wing and pivot. Amongst the top Indian buys, Telugu Talons went for Raghu Kumara (pivot) a four-time national champion, Garvit Gujarat secured Harender Singh Nain (right back) as their star Indian player, a three-time national champion and a two-time gold medallist at the Federation Cup tournaments and Golden Eagles Uttar Pradesh selected Bhushan Shinde (right wing) as their most valuable Indian asset for the league. For Maharashtra Ironmen, winger Ankit Kumar – a member of gold medal winning Indian squads for the IHF Trophy- in 2016 & 2018 – and a silver medallist at the 2019 South Asian Games, was the most valuable player. Delhi Panzers went for pivot Mintu Sardar, again a three-time national champion and lastly, Rajasthan selected Robin Singh (left back) – a four-time national champion as their most valuable Indian star player.
The final category of the day was called role players and 56 domestic Indian players went under the hammer, with 42 picked. Telugu Talons’ most valuable in this category was Rahul Nain (pivot), Garvit Gujarat went with right back Surender Kumar and Golden Eagles selected Sanchit Gupta (right wing) and Mohit Punia (right back) joined Maharashtra Ironmen. Delhi Panzers went with youth and picked up the 20-year-old pivot Deepak and lastly, Rajasthan secured Mohit Ghanghas (left back) as their biggest player in the role players category.
Speaking about the auction process, Manu Agrawal, founder and CEO of PHL commercial rights holders Bluesport Entertainment Private Limited, said, “We have been working on solidifying the structure of the Premier Handball League for a while. A successful auction process has taken us a step closer to D-Day. I would like to thank all the franchise owners, the South Asian Handball Federation and Handball Association India for making the auctions a huge success. Being the first edition, it took a lot of research by the franchises to select the best 17 for their team but this also makes the inaugural season even more exciting as a lot of unknown elements will be at play when they finally get onto the field.”
PHL is sanctioned by the South Asian Handball Federation and affiliated with the Asian Handball Federation (AHF). The inaugural season is set to kick off on June 8 and run until June 25. The tournament will be broadcast on the Viacom18 network on JioCinema, Sports 18-1 (HD & SD) and Sports18 Khel.
