IPL 2025 Mega Auction: Procedure, Marquee Players, Retention List, Rules – All You Need To Know

The 2024 IPL mega auction is set to take place in the Saudi Arabian city of Jeddah on the 24^th and 25^th of November and will see 574 players go under the hammer to fill 204 slots in what are expected to be two days of non-stop drama and action. The last mega auction took place in 2022 where two new franchises – Gujarat Titans and Lucknow Super Giants – were added to the league. The IPL auction is being held outside India only for the second time – Dubai hosted the mini-auction last year. (More Cricket News)

We look at a brief history of the mega auction, how the teams stack up with their respective purses, the players retained, the RTM option and the set of marquee players announced ahead of the mega eventin an all-inclusive explainer.

What is a mega auction?

A mega auction is a grand IPL auction in which teams get a chance to completely overhaul their squads and build literally from scratch. With the exception of a handful of players who they are allowed to retain, franchises have to strategize, do a lot of number crunching and pick their remaining pool of players. The mega auction is usually held every three years. There have previously been four mega auctions –in 2011, 2014, 2018 and 2022 – all in Bengaluru. The mega auction this year will be held at the Abady Al Johar Arena (also known as Benchmark Arena) in Jeddah.

How many players will be a part of the auction and what is the procedure?

The long list consisted of 1574 players which was pruned to 574. 366 of these players are Indian and the remaining 208 are from overseas. Australia and England will be represented by 37 players each. South Africa is next on the list with 31 players and are followed by New Zealand and West Indies who have 24 and 22 players respectively. Sri Lanka (19 players), Afghanistan (18), Bangladesh (12), Zimbabwe (3), Ireland and USA (2) and Scotland (1) complete the list.

The list can be further categorized as:
Capped Indian players – 48
Capped overseas players – 193
Associate players – 3
Uncapped Indian players -318
Uncapped overseas - 12

Each team has to build a squad of maximum 25 players (minimum 18) so a total of 250 players (max) need to be selected for the 10 franchises. 46 players have already been retained by the various franchises which means a maximum of 204 slots need to be filled. The first 116 players will go through the normal bidding process across the two days of the auction. However, an accelerated process will be followed from player 117 onwards.

The auction will commence with two sets of marquee players followed by a full-round of capped players by role – batter, all-rounder, wicket-keeper, fast bowler, spin bowler and then move on to a similar full round for uncapped players.

Who are the marquee players at the IPL mega auction?

There are a total of 12 marquee players divided into two sets of six each. Set 1 consists of Jos Buttler, Shreyas Iyer, Rishabh Pant, Kagiso Rabada, Arshdeep Singh and Mitchell Starc. Set 2 includes Yuzvendra Chahal, Liam Livingstone, David Miller, KL Rahul, Mohammed Shami, Mohammed Siraj. All marquee players have a base price of INR 2 crore with the exception of David Miller who has a base price of INR 1.5 crore.

How many players have already been retained by each franchise?

Each franchisecould retain a maximum of 6 players either in a dedicated window before the mega auction or by using the RTM (Right To Match) card at the end of the auction. A maximum of five of these players could be capped and a maximum of two could be uncapped.

List of retained players

Mumbai Indians

Players retained: 5
Jasprit Bumrah (INR 18 crore), Suryakumar Yadav (INR 16.35 crore), Hardik Pandya (INR 16.35 crore), Rohit Sharma (INR 16.30 crore), Tilak Varma (INR 8 crore)

Right-to-match (RTM) options at auction: 1

Players eligible for RTM: One uncapped player

Sunrisers Hyderabad

Players retained: 5
Heinrich Klaasen (INR 23 crore), Pat Cummins (INR 18 crore), Abhishek Sharma (INR 14 crore), Travis Head (INR 14 crore), Nitish Kumar Reddy (INR 6 crore)

Right-to-match (RTM) options at auction: 1

Players eligible for RTM: One uncapped player

Royal Challengers Bengaluru

Players retained: 3
Virat Kohli (INR 21 crore), Rajat Patidar (INR 11 crore), Yash Dayal (INR 5 crore)

Right-to-match (RTM) options at auction: 3

Players eligible for RTM: One uncapped player and two capped players, or three capped players

Chennai Super Kings

Players retained: 5
Ruturaj Gaikwad (INR 18 crore), Ravindra Jadeja (INR 18 crore), Matheesha Pathirana (INR 13 crore), Shivam Dube (INR 12 crore), MS Dhoni (INR 4 crore)

Right-to-match (RTM) options at auction: 1

Players eligible for RTM: One capped or uncapped player

Delhi Capitals

Players retained: 4
Axar Patel (INR 16.50 crore), Kuldeep Yadav (INR 13.25 crore), Tristan Stubbs (INR 10 crore), Abishek Porel (INR 4 crore)

Right-to-match (RTM) options at auction: 2

Players eligible for RTM: One uncapped player and one capped player, or two capped players

Kolkata Knight Riders

Players retained: 6
Rinku Singh (INR 13 crore), Varun Chakravarthy (INR 12 crore), Sunil Narine (INR 12 crore), Andre Russell (INR 12 crore), Harshit Rana (INR 4 crore), Ramandeep Singh (INR 4 crore)

Right-to-match (RTM) options at auction: None

Players eligible for RTM: None

Rajasthan Royals

Players retained: 6
Sanju Samson (INR 18 crore), Yashasvi Jaiswal (INR 18 crore), Riyan Parag (INR 14 crore), Dhruv Jurel (INR 14 crore), Shimron Hetmyer (INR 11 crore), Sandeep Sharma (INR 4 crore)

Right-to-match (RTM) options at auction: None

Players eligible for RTM: None

Gujarat Titans

Players retained: 5
Rashid Khan (INR 18 crore), Shubman Gill (INR 16.50 crore), Sai Sudharsan (INR 8.50 crore), Rahul Tewatia (INR 4 crore), Shahrukh Khan (INR 4 crore)

Right-to-match (RTM) options at auction: One

Players eligible for RTM: One capped player

Lucknow Super Giants

Players retained: 5
Nicholas Pooran (INR 21 crore), Ravi Bishnoi (INR 11 crore) Mayank Yadav (INR 11 crore), Mohsin Khan (INR 4 crore), Ayush Badoni (INR 4 crore)

Right-to-match (RTM) options at auction: 1

Players eligible for RTM: One capped player

Punjab Kings

Players retained: 2
Shashank Singh (INR 5.5 crore), Prabhsimran Singh (INR 4 crore)

Right-to-match (RTM) options at auction: 4

Players eligible for RTM: Four capped players

What is this Right To Match (RTM) card?

The RTM option helps a franchise retain its core players/player who might have been bought by another franchise during the normal bidding process at the mega auction.

Here is how it works:
If a player has been bought by another franchise during the mega auction, the franchise to which he belonged in IPL 2024 can match the bid at the end of the auction. The franchise to which the player was sold at this year’s mega auction then gets a chance to increase their bid to whatever amount they want. The previous franchise then gets the option to buy back the player by matching the increased bid.

How many players can each franchise buy at the auction?

CSK: 20 (7 overseas)

RCB: 22 (8 overseas)

SRH: 20 (5 overseas)

MI: 20 (8 overseas)

DC: 21 (7 overseas)

RR: 19 (7 overseas)

PBKS: 23 (8 overseas)

KKR: 19 (6 overseas)

GT: 20 (7 overseas)

LSG: 20 (7 overseas)

What is the purse available to each team?

Each team has a budget of INR 120 crore for the mega auction but a part of it has already been spent in player retentions.

Here is a team-wise breakdown of the purse remaining:
Punjab Kings – INR 110.5 crore
Royal Challengers Bengaluru – INR 83 crore
Delhi Capitals – INR 73 crore
Gujarat Titans – INR 69 crore
Lucknow Super Giants – INR 69 crore
Chennai Super Kings – INR 55 crore
Kolkata Knight Riders – INR 51 crore
Mumbai Indians – INR 45 crore
Sunrisers Hyderabad – INR 45 crore
Rajasthan Royals – INR 41 crore

Notable omissions, the oldest, youngest and the new slinger

- Some big names like Jofra Archer, Cameron Green, Ben Stokes and Mark Wood have opted out of the mega auction.

- James Anderson will make his first appearance in an IPL auction and has a base price of INR 1.25 crore. He has never played the IPL. At 42, Anderson will be the oldest player at the auction.

- Vaibhav Suryavanshi, at 13, will be the youngest player at the auction. He has played five first-class matches for Bihar and recently scored a ton for India U-19 against their Australian counterparts in Chennai.

- DuminduSewmina, the right-arm fast bowler from Sri Lanka, may attract a few franchises at the auction. He has a low, slingy action like Lasith Malinga and Matheesha Pathirana.