The two franchise teams of the prestigious Indian Premier League (IPL), Chennai Super Kings and Rajasthan Royals, who look set for a comeback after serving a ban for two years for their involvement in the spot-fixing case, might be given a chance to retain players from Pune Supergiants and Gujarat Lions. The IPL governing council raised the proposal on Monday.
The proposal, if agreed upon will see the much-anticipated return of Mahendra Singh Dhoni to his former team Chennai Super King where he led the team for eight seasons.
The proposal of retaining minimum three players which includes two overseas and one Indian player will be placed in front of the franchise owners during a workshop next month. A member of IPL Governing Council while talking to PTI said,
“We are going to propose minimum three retentions – 1 Indian and two foreigners. The players, who played for Pune and Gujarat in last two years, can be retained by Chennai Super Kings and Rajasthan Royals. We will place it in front of owners during a workshop next month.”
Chennai if given an opportunity will like to bring Dhoni, who played for Pune Supergiants in the last two seasons back in their squad, as he has been a star player and an exceptional leader for their side. They were crowned champions twice under his captaincy in 2010 and 2011, respectively.
Rajiv Shukla, the IPL chairman, said the number of retentions including the Right to Match could be anything between three and five depending on what the majority of the franchises agree.
Notably, all the franchise owners have made an appeal to the Governing Council regarding the increase in salary purse from Rs 60 crore to Rs 75 crore. However, some of the franchises even want it to be Rs 80 crore. According to reports, this issue will be discussed at the meeting and have high chances of agreeing to it.