IPL Auction 2025: The first day of the mega auction saw 10 Indian Premier League franchises splashing Rs 467.95 crore on 72 players. Three stars – Rishabh Pant (Rs 27 crore, LSG), Shreyas Iyer (Rs 26.75 crore, PBKS) and Venkatesh Iyer (Rs 23.75 crore, KKR) – went over Rs 23-crore mark. There were other records too with Yuzvendra Chahal (Rs 18 crore, PBKS) becoming the most expensive Indian spinner ever while Arshdeep Singh (Rs 18 crore, PBKS) becoming the most expensive Indian pacer. On Day 2 of the auction, big names like Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Faf du Plessis, Washington Sundar, Marco Jansen, Deepak Chahar, Krunal Pandya will go under the hammer.
After the first day of auction, Royal Challengers Bengaluru are left with maximum purse of Rs 30.65 crore.
Purse remaining for all 10 IPL teams after Day 1 of auction:
RCB: Rs 30.65 cr – 6 buys
MI: Rs 26.10 cr – 4 buys
PBKS: Rs 22.50 cr – 10 buys
GT: Rs 17.5 cr – 9 buys
RR: Rs 17.35 cr – 5 buys
CSK: Rs 15.6 cr – 7 buys
LSG: Rs 14.85 – 7 buys
DC: Rs 13.8 cr – 9 buys
KKR: Rs 10.05 – 7 buys
SRH: Rs 5.15 cr – 8 buys
Resurrected generational talent Rishabh Pant pipped Shreyas Iyer to become the costliest buy in IPL’s history with a Rs 27 crore winning bid from Lucknow Super Giants, while Venkatesh Iyer was the surprise show-stopper as teams expectedly went the extra mile for marquee Indian players at the mega auction on Sunday.
Shreyas, who captained the Kolkata Knight Riders to the title earlier this year, and Delhi Capitals’ icon Pant, reaped the benefits of making themselves available at the auction following differences with their respective teams.
Venkatesh was also a part of Shreyas’ triumphant KKR outfit and the franchise had to pay a whopping Rs 23.75 crore to bring him back after not retaining him.
The batting all-rounder, who has become an integral part of the KKR setup over the years, gained from an intense bidding battle between the Kolkata side and Royal Challengers Bengaluru to end with a massive sum.
Shreyas, on the other hand, was the first one to surpass Mitchell Starc as the IPL’s most expensive buy with cash-heavy Punjab Kings shelling out Rs 26.75 crore for their potential captain before Pant overtook the fellow Indian by attracting Rs 25 lakh more from LSG.
Former DC teammates Shreyas and Pant have had to deal with adversity in the past couple of years but have shown remarkable resilience and courage to bounce back.
Pant beat all odds to make a successful comeback after a life-threatening car accident in 2022 while Shreyas put behind his exclusion from the BCCI central contracts list to lead KKR to their third IPL trophy earlier this year.
Delhi Capitals expectedly enabled the Right To Match to buy back Pant at Rs 20.75 crore but LSG raised the bid to Rs 27 crore and the former decided against matching that amount.
With PTI inputs