By: Tarish Bhatt
Call it a step to save a few bucks or a smart move to shop the best – the mantra of the IPL teams is to pick a smaller squad for the 2016 season.
Barring the Mumbai Indians, which had always kept the maximum number of players, at least six teams have shown their willingness to keep a squad between 18 to 21 players.
With the limit of maximum 25 players in every IPL team, these five franchises are looking to go the Big Bash way — where every the magic number is 18.
With an option of getting a replacement in place of an injured players, the teams are looking at this as a good mechanism to end the culture of spreading bad vibes from those who get dropped from the playing squad.
“If the squad is manageable enough, you don’t have to worry about the dressing room atmosphere. Still, you can’t have any control over the auction but the general consensus is to pick a team, which would be easily manned by the team management,” a team official, who didn’t wish to be named, told Drcricket7.
These teams are also looking to buy a few better players with a bigger sum of money rather than spending on four cricketers, who may not get a chance in the playing XI in the season.
“The teams are looking at the rationalist bit before spending money on the players. After eight years, they also know the best way to shop the best players at the auction,” the source revealed.
Right now, the Mumbai Indians have the maximum retained players in their team. The defending champions have 19 cricketers in their team. The Kolkata Knight Riders, which was one of the first teams to start their season with a short squad have retained 15 players like the Sunrisers Hyderabad.
While the Delhi Daredevils, Royals Challengers Bangalore and Kings XI Punjab have 14 players each. The two new teams – Pune and Rajkot – have the maximum purse for the auction with five players each.
Earlier, the maximum strength of an IPL squad was 33 where only eight foreigners were allowed to be picked. When the IPL became a 10-team affair, the foreign cricketers’ category went from eight to 10. However, it was again reduced to nine a few years ago.
