All the franchises in the IPL have already announced their official retention list on October 1 ahead of the Mega Auction. Kolkata Knight Riders announced Rinku Singh (Rs 13), Sunil Narine (Rs 12 crore), Andre Russell (Rs 12 crore), Varun Chakravarthy (Rs 12 crore), Harshit Rana (Rs 4 crore) and Ramandeep Singh (Rs 4 crore) as their retentions. However, the surprising thing was that they did not retain their IPL winning captain, Shreyas Iyer.
KKR CEO, Venky Mysore stated that they did want to retain Shreyas Iyer but also talked about the various factors that play behind the scene in a player’s retention. He stated that the franchise does not enjoy one sided right in retaining a player and has to take into account the will of the player.
“The interesting thing about retention is that there are so many aspects to it and forces as play. But what is fundamental to a retention that most people sometimes don’t understand that it’s a matter of mutually agreeing. It’s not a one-sided right that a franchise has. The player also has to consider various factors and agree,” Mysore told Rev Sports in an interview.
Shreyas Iyer captained Kolkata Knight Riders to IPL 2024 trophy
He added that a player might want to test their value in auction or is not happy with the retention amount. These are the factors that influence the decision making process.
Shreyas Iyer has been released by KKR ahead of IPL 2025 Mega-Auction (Image Source: X)
“Sometimes along the line that agreement doesn’t happen because of various factors; money or somebody wants to test their value or whatever it is. That influences a decision as well, eventually, but he was No.1 on our list,” Mysore said.
Mysore said that they wanted to build a team around Iyer and hence picked him up ahead of IPL 2022. Iyer missed out the IPL 2023 season due to injury but Mysore added that as soon as Iyer was available ahead of IPL 2024, they reappointed him as captain.
However, he feels that the player has to make his own decisions at the end of the day. KKR secured the IPL 2024 trophy under the captaincy of Shreyas Iyer.
