Six Associate players in final IPL auction list

A total of 351 players, which includes 122 capped internationals, will feature in the IPL auction, scheduled to be held in Bangalore on February 20. The final roster was pruned from the original list of 799 players, after the eight franchises submitted their wishlists to the IPL.

Fast bowler Ishant Sharma is one of the seven players with a maximum base price of INR 2 crore - approximately US $298,000 - for the tenth player auction. The other six include three England players - allrounder Ben Stokes, ODI and T20I captain Eoin Morgan and allrounder Chris Woakes - two Australian fast men Mitchell Johnson and Pat Cummins, and Sri Lanka captain Angelo Mathews.

In the initial list there were 160 capped players from nine countries - none from Pakistan - and 639 uncapped ones. The final list also contained six players from the Associates, including five from Afghanistan: captain Asghar Stanikzai, Mohammad Nabi, Mohammad Shahzad, Rashid Khan and Dawlat Zadran. Shahzad and Rashid have the highest base prices among the five at INR 50 lakh. UAE batsman Chirag Suri was the other Associate player in the list.

Seamer Sudeep Tyagi, who has played four ODIs, is the only one to have been cut from the original list of 24 capped Indian players.

Considering they will have to put a majority of their players back into the auction in 2018, some franchise officials said they would not be too aggressive in buying players this season. However, they did agree that there would be considerable interest in the English players.

Although the IPL is yet to decide on the retention rules, franchises expect the right-to-match option to be available. This allows a franchise to buy back a specific number of the players they have released for the auction by matching the highest bid those players attract. If they match the bid, they get the player.