IPL 2025 Auction – KKR target players – The biggest cricket league in the world, the IPL, will undergo a massive restoration ahead of the next season. The IPL 2024 Player Auction is scheduled to take place in Dubai at the Coca-Cola Arena on December 19th, 2023. All the existing ten franchises of the Indian Premier League have announced their final lists of retained players ahead of the upcoming IPL 2024 auctions. The upcoming IPL 2024 Auction is going to be very important for all the ten teams. All the franchises will try to construct their squads almost from the scratch. The team management will adopt different strategies before going into the auction. In this article we will talk about Kolkata Knight Riders and its approach towards the auction. It will be interesting to see who they will target now as they will try to built a team under a new captain.
For the Knight Riders, the IPL 2023 eventually became quite unforgettable as the team was unable to get to the playoffs. However, the next IPL cycle now demands a fresh start. KKR certainly has a lot to pick and choose from their current squad. KKR spent 42 Crores in retaining 4 players. The Knight Riders have retained their undoubtedly most promising players like Andre Russell, Indian players Varun Chakravarty, Shreyas Iyer and Venkatesh Iyer, and veteran all-rounder Sunil Narine. KKR let go of players like Shakib Al Hasan, Shardul Thakur, Tim Southee.
IPL 2024 : Kolkata Knight Riders retained and released players list
Retained Players: Andre Russell, Anukul Roy, Harshit Rana, Jason Roy, Nitish Rana, Rahmanullah Gurbaz , Rinku Singh, Shreyas Iyer, Sunil Narine, Suyash Sharma, Vaibhav Arora, Varun Chakaravarthy, Venkatesh Iyer
Released Players: Aarya Desai, David Wiese, Johnson Charles, Kulwant Khejroliya, Litton Das, Lockie Ferguson, Mandeep Singh, N. Jagadeesan, Shakib Al Hasan, Shardul Thakur, Tim Southee, Umesh Yadav
IPL 2024 Auction – KKR target players
KKR auction strategy 2024 will be somewhat different from the other teams. Since the franchise in recent years had a flawless blend of quality Indian players along with some overseas white-ball veterans, it will be very interesting to see their final retentions and eliminations. Here is the list of players that KKR might target in the upcoming IPL 2024 Auctions.
Shardul Thakur
Kolkata Knight Riders bought Shardul Thakur for a hefty amount in the previous auction. However, the all rounder failed to live up to his expectations. Ahead of IPL 2024 auction, KKR have released Shardul and they might go after him in order to bought him again for a much lesser amount. Given what he brings to the table, the Kolkata franchise might be interested to have him again by trying to purchase him at the auction. The 30-year-old bowling all-rounder is at the peak of his powers. When he returned to the UAE for IPL 2021, he was one of CSK’s star performers, claiming massive scalps game after game, including the final. He ended up as one of the top wicket-takers in IPL 2021. Thakur’s variations with the ball come in handy in T20 cricket. Add to that, he will add depth to the batting unit. He also comes in the list of KKR target players 2024.
Mitchell Starc
Mitchell Starc will be returning to IPL after eight long years. Starc’s last IPL appearance came in 2015. In 2018 auction, KKR snapped him for a whopping INR 9.4 crore. Unfortunately, he missed that season with a leg injury and was released by the franchise later on. For 2024 auction, KKR have already released fast bowlers Tim Southee and Lockie Ferguson. They will definitely target a fast pacer and Starc is one of the best left-arm pacers in world cricket. It is true that Starc is no more the same version of himself as he was in IPL 2015 but still be very useful, particularly for KKR.
Pat Cummins
Pat Cummins is just another target for KKR in IPL 2024 auctions. The Australia skipper was a part of KKR in the last three IPL tournaments but decided to opt out of 2023 campaign due to a packed international schedule. In the three seasons for Kolkata, Cummins delivered with bat but was unable to succeed as a bowler. However, he has improved himself in the recent times and had a successful campaign with Australia as he led his nation to World Cup glory. It is well known fact that Cummins would go very high in the IPL 2024 Auction. KKR will definitely try to get him back in auctions.
