IPL franchises hope for leeway in player retention, purse amount and RTM rules ahead of Mega Auction

The Indian Premier League’s Governing Council meeting will likely occur on July 31. Among many agendas, the increase in team purse from 100 crore to 125 crore and feasible Right To Match (RTM) options are at the forefront. The 2025 season of the cash-rich league will see a mega auction and all the 10 franchises will converge in Mumbai on Wednesday to grasp the crucial developments and pitch in their requests.

According to a report from NDTV Sports, one glaring concern that every franchise has is the limited number of player retentions. Previously, every franchise was allowed to retain four players before mega auctions, given the number of Indian players does not exceed three and overseas two. Moreover, the uncapped players, if a franchise wishes to retain were limited to two.  

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"I think that (increase of purse) is happening for sure. The standard increase should be anywhere between 20 to 25 percent and hence anything in the range of Rs 120 crore to 125 crore will be a fair deal. Most franchises would agree to it,” said a senior official of an IPL franchise.

Player retention rules are of utmost concern for franchises

The source from a well-known franchise also revealed that franchises are mulling requests from the board to amend the rules and increase the capping to five or six players. The point of concern here was the constraint teams felt in leaving out their priced foreign players with the allotted cap of just two players. Further emphasis could be put into quashing the Impact Player rule, which has got immense flak from former cricketers and stalwarts like Rohit Sharma and Virat Kohli. 

"Obviously, continuity and maintaining a core is very important going forward. May be allow six (retentions) including a couple of RTM cards with at least one uncapped player being kept in the mix. But there could be some debate over the number of overseas retentions.”

"There are teams like Delhi Capitals (Jake Fraser-McGurk and Tristan Stubbs) and Sunrisers Hyderabad (Pat Cummins, Heinrich Klaasen, and Travis Head), who would want more than one overseas retention," said a source from well-known franchise.