5 players Delhi Daredevils might retain for next IPL

The 2017 edition ended on a sour note for the Delhi Daredevils as they narrowly missed out on the playoffs berth this season. They were pretty much in the contention for the playoffs until the very late stages of the league fixtures. However, the Zaheer Khan-led camp ended up falling short by 2 wins in their campaign this year. A couple of more wins this season would have helped them make the playoffs after almost half decade.

Over the years, the Daredevils camp has been seen as an unfortunate one. They do everything right in the tournament but end up crashing out of the race with a string of poor performances towards the business end of the tournament. This year, they had started off on a good note winning in the first half of the tournament. Later, they lost their plot midway that saw them move to the bottom four of the points table.

They could never really escalate higher since then and ended up being in the same league at the conclusion of the 56 league match fixtures. Delhi Daredevils were also under the scanner for having picked up an unbalanced squad this year. They did not have any big name in their batting order which put a lot of pressure on the Indian batsmen. In the bowling department, they had the problem of plenty.

Considering all these mismatches, it would be interesting to see what combinations they work on in the next edition of the tournament. If there is a player retention policy next year, the Delhi Daredevils could possibly retain these players at the auctions:

Rishabh Pant

Hard-hitting young batsman Rishabh Pant has been a revelation this season. Pant walked into the tournament riding on some superlative run in the domestic circuit. The Delhi batsman plundered a triple ton against Maharashtra in the Ranji Trophy. In the very same tournament, he hit the fastest century of the tournament history against the team Jharkhand. He continued his good run in the DY Patil T20 tournament in Mumbai and then walked into the IPL 2017 for the Delhi Daredevils camp.

He showed that he can be a very dangerous batsman on his day. In the league fixture against Kolkata Knight Riders, he hit 26 runs off a single over off the bowling of Umesh Yadav. Later, in the match against the Gujarat Lions, Rishabh Pant hammered 97 off just 43 balls to set up a 208 run chase. Considering his hitting ability, he is certainly one to preserve in the longer run.