MUMBAI: A meeting held here Tuesday that had the owners of the eight original of the Indian Premier League teams, with BCCI officials, IPL governing council members and the Supreme Court-appointed Committee of Administrators has made clear one thing. There definitely be retention of players in IPL 2018, the only question is how many.
At one end of the spectrum was the Mukesh Ambani owned defending champions Mumbai Indians, which reportedly pitched for retaining seven players. If MI gets its way, it would be able to retain five and also use two right-to-match (RTM) cards. The N Srinivasan owned Chennai Super Kings, the other big team in the IPL, also declared itself on the retention side – looking at retaining four with one RTM.
At the other end were Kings XI Punjab and Rajasthan Royals, with both franchises in favour of a no-retention policy.
Auction purse and squad size
Last year’s auction purse was Rs 660 million. The team owners want the purse to be capped between Rs 750 million and Rs 850 million. Barring Kings XI Punjab, who felt the squad size be limited to 22 players, all other teams felt each squad should have 25 to 27 players. The maximum squad size for now is 27.
No Women’s IPL
Representative of Mumbai Indians suggested a women’s IPL. The members quashed it citing that the last IPL GC meeting had already discussed organising exhibition matches between three to four women’s teams during the IPL due to the lack of quality women cricketers to start a league.
