Indian Premier League (IPL) franchise Rajasthan Royals have reportedly retained its skipper Sanju Samson ahead of the upcoming mega auction which will be held before the IPL 2022 edition.
Samson took over the captaincy reins in IPL 2021 and had joined the franchise for the second time in IPL 2018 for INR 8 crore. He made 484 runs at a strike rate of 137 with one century in IPL 2021.
"Yes, Sanju Samson has been retained. We will disclose the other players in the coming days," said the Rajasthan Royals source to ANI.
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ESPNCricinfo reported that the 27-year old will continue as captain after agreeing to an INR 14 crore per season contract this week. The frontrunners for the remaining three slots (in no particular order) are - wicketkeeper-batter Jos Buttler, fast bowler Jofra Archer, allrounder Liam Livingstone - and uncapped opener Yashasvi Jaiswal.
However, the franchise is still mulling on Archer given his fitness issues but doesn’t want to let the pacer go into the auction. Buttler is expected to sign off on the retention soon but Stokes' position is unclear.
As far as Stokes is concerned, there is a huge concern about money and whether the franchise will have enough of it to make an offer. As per the IPL rules, a team can retain a total of four players of which a maximum of two can be overseas.
If RR retains the four players, it will cost them INR 42 crore, leaving them with INR 48 crores to spend in the IPL 2022 mega auction. Royals are expected to seal the final three retentions by November 28.
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The BCCI added two new teams in the IPL 2022 edition- Lucknow and Ahmedabad- who have been allotted a budget of Rs 33 crore to pick three players who go back into the pool before the mega auction begins.
The BCCI has set the retention window for the eight older franchises from November 1-30, and the window for Lucknow and Ahmedabad is from December 1-25.
If one of the eight existing franchises decides to retain four players, then they will be debited INR 16 crores for the first player, INR 12 crores for the second player, INR 8 crores for the third player, and INR 6 crores for the fourth player and the total deduction will be INR 42 crores.
(ANI and ESPNCricinfo inputs)
