Kolkata Knight Riders are the third-most successful franchise in the history of the Indian Premier League. They were a phenomenal force to be reckoned with under the leadership of Gautam Gambhir.
Under Gambhir’s tutelage, the Knight Riders made it to the finals in IPL 2012 and IPL 2014. KKR defied the odds and came through with flying colours in both the seasons.
At first, KKR beat CSK in the IPL 2012 final to win their maiden title. After that, they went on to defeat Kings XI Punjab (now Punjab Kings) in the IPL 2014 final to win their second title.
After Gautam Gambhir retired from the IPL, the two-time IPL champions were clueless in most of the seasons since IPL 2014. However, they somehow found their mojo back in IPL 2021 season but lost to CSK in the final.
Kolkata Knight Riders retained Players, released players and Purse Remaining ahead of IPL 2023 auction
The upcoming mini-IPL auction is scheduled to be held on December 23 in Kochi. Meanwhile, the trading window of the IPL 2023 season officially came to a close on November 15 (Tuesday).
All the respective 10 teams submitted their final list of retained players ahead of the mini auction. Meanwhile, Kolkata Knight Riders retained their captain Shreyas Iyer, mystery spinner Varun Chakravarthy, danger man Andre Russell and other star players.
They traded Shardul Thakur from Delhi Capitals and Rahmanullah Gurbaz from Gujarat Titans and Lockie Ferguson from Gujarat Titans. KKR have a remaining purse of Rs 7.05 crore and have three overseas slots left.
Players retained by KKR
Shreyas Iyer (c), Nitish Rana, Rahmanullah Gurbaz, Venkatesh Iyer, Andre Russell, Sunil Narine, Shardul Thakur, Lockie Ferguson, Umesh Yadav, Tim Southee, Harshit Rana, Varun Chakravarthy, Anukul Roy, Rinku Singh
Released Players:
Pat Cummins, Sam Billings, Aman Khan (traded), Shivam Mavi, Mohammad Nabi, Chamika Karunaratne, Aaron Finch, Alex Hales, Abhijeet Tomar, Ajinkya Rahane, Ashok Sharma, Baba Indrajith, Pratham Singh, Ramesh Kumar, Rasikh Salam, Sheldon Jackson
