The IPL mega auction for the 2025 season is set to take place on November 24 and 25 in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. The BCCI has informed all franchises that the bidding for marquee players will be conducted in two separate sets. The auction will be held at the prestigious Abadi Al Johar Arena, also known as the Benchmark Arena, in Jeddah.
According to information received from the franchises preparing for the mega auction, the BCCI has told them that there will be two marquee lists consisting of 8-9 players in each set. It is not uncommon for the marquee list of star players in the mega auction to have only two elite lists. The last auction 2022 had only one set of marquee players. However, the 2018 and 2014 auctions had two sets.
The players who have made it to the Elite grade include Rishabh Pant, KL Rahul, Shreyas Iyer, Mohammed Siraj, Mohammed Shami, Arshdeep Singh, R Ashwin, Mitchell Starc and Jos Buttler. Ben Stokes could also have participated in the auction, but he did not register for this year’s auction.
Each marquee player has registered himself at a price of Rs 2 crore. It is believed that by the end of the first two sets, 30 to 50 per cent of the available auction amount will have been spent. Each franchise is likely to acquire at least two big names, who could be priced between Rs 20-25 crore on average, which will take the total to Rs 200-250 crore from the total available purse of Rs 641.5 crore. The franchise has already spent Rs 558.5 crore out of the Rs 1200 crore on retentions recently.
Punjab Kings will enter this mega auction with the highest purse. Punjab has Rs 110.5 crore. Punjab can include many players in its team by bidding high. Now it has to be seen which players have been kept in the marquee players. What will be their number. BCCI will release that too in the next few days.
1574 players registered for the auction:
BCCI recently informed that 1,574 players have registered for the IPL mega auction. Which includes 1,165 Indian players and 409 foreign players. This list includes 320 capped, 1224 uncapped and 30 associate players. A total of 46 players have been retained by the franchise.
BCCI has asked the franchise to suggest new names whom they want to include in the auction. The franchise was also asked to respond by November 12 with the list of players whom they want to include in the final list. If all the franchises include 25 players in their teams, then 204 players will be bid in the auction. Out of which 70 players can be foreigners.
List of players in the auction register:
Capped Indian (48 players)
Capped International (272 players)
Associate (30 players)
Uncapped Indian who were part of the last IPL season (152 players)
Uncapped International who were part of the last IPL season (3 players)
Uncapped Indian (965 players)
Uncapped International (104 players)