 "Defending champions Kolkata Knight Riders decided to retain both Andre Russell and Sunil Narine ahead of the IPL 2025 mega auction. PTI")
Kolkata Knight Riders’ list of retained and released players: Shreyas Iyer was not retained by the Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) despite leading them to their third Indian Premier League (IPL) title earlier this year, with the ‘Purple Brigade’ opting to retain Rinku Singh, Varun Chakravarthy, Sunil Narine, Andre Russell, Harshit Rana and Ramandeep Singh, filling all six retention slots in the process.
LIVE | IPL Retention 2025 Updates: 10 teams to announce list of retained and released players today
KKR went with middle-order batter Rinku as their top pick at Rs 13 crore, hinting at possibly naming him captain after releasing Shreyas Iyer back into the retention pool. Indian leg-spinner Chakravarthy as well as West Indian all-rounders Narine and Russell have been retained at Rs 12 crore each. Rana and Ramandeep fill the uncapped slots at Rs 4 crore.
Iyer had been appointed captain right away by KKR in 2022 after parting ways with Delhi Capitals, and had led the franchise in the 2022 and 2024 seasons, with Nitish Rana captaining the Knight Riders in his absence in 2023. Iyer has reportedly been receiving captaincy offers from several franchises ahead of the IPL mega auction.
KKR have also released Australian speedster Mitchell Starc, whom they had acquired for a record Rs 24.75 crore last season.
By fill all six slots, KKR have spent have spent a total of Rs 57 crore ahead of the mega auction out of the total retention purse of Rs 120 crore.
Impact Shorts
More ShortsKKR’s list of retained players: Rinku Singh, Varun Chakravarthy, Sunil Narine, Andre Russell, Harshit Rana and Ramandeep Singh.
KKR’s list of released players: Shreyas Iyer (c), Nitish Rana, Rahmanullah Gurbaz, Phil Salt, Suyash Sharma, Anukul Roy, Venkatesh Iyer, Harshit Rana, Vaibhav Arora, KS Bharat, Chetan Sakariya, Mitchell Starc, Angkrish Raghuvanshi, Sherfane Rutherford, Manish Pandey, Allah Ghazanfar, Dushmantha Chameera, Sakib Hussain, Jason Roy, Gus Atkinson, Mujeeb Ur Rahman
IPL 2025 mega auction purse remaining for KKR: Rs 63 crore
RTM options left for mega auction: 1
Surprise omissions for KKR: Shreyas Iyer (c), Mitchell Starc, Venkatesh Iyer, Phil Salt
Which players KKR retained before IPL 2022 mega auction?
Three players from the current list – Russell, Narine and Chakravarthy – had been retained ahead of the 2022 mega auction – with the franchise also retaining seam-bowling all-rounder Venkatesh at Rs 8 crore.
Russell had been retained at the highest bracket of Rs 12 crore with Chakravarthy at Rs 8 crore and Narine at Rs 6 crore. The franchise chose not to retain captain Eoin Morgan, who had led them to the final of the 2021 edition in which they lost to the MS Dhoni-led CSK by 27 runs in Dubai.