Kolkata-based industrialist Sanjiv Goenka, who successfully bid for the Pune franchise of the Indian Premier League (IPL) on Tuesday, will have the first option to pick a player from the IPL Draft on December 15, but he refused to divulge anything about who his first-choice player would be.
Pune and Rajkot became the new franchises of the IPL, replacing Chennai Super Kings (CSK) and Rajasthan Royals (RR) who are serving a two-year suspension for their officials’ involvement in IPL betting.
Goenka’s New Rising won the bid for Pune while Intex won the bid for Rajkot franchise on Monday through a reverse-bidding process employed by the IPL Governing Council.
New Rising bid Rs -16 crore while Intex made a bid of Rs -10 crore, and since the rules state lowest bidder gets to pick first player from the Draft, Goenka’s Pune will do that on Dec 15 from among 20 players in the Draft.
Five capped and five uncapped players from CSK and RR each will be part of the draft, and the biggest fish will be CSK and India captain MS Dhoni.
Speculations are rife that Dhoni, who also guided CSK to two IPL titles, would be the first choice for Pune.
Goenka, however, refused to share any shortlist of his franchise and said they will look to make a balanced team for the next two years.
“MS Dhoni is one of the finest and greatest leaders. As of now, we haven’t formulated any plan. It was about winning the bid. As far as picking Pune as our venue, it made the most commercial sense,” Goenka told reporters on Monday.
This is Goenka’s second sports business venture after becoming a majority stakeholder of Indian Super League champions Atletico de Kolkata, where he is partnered by former India captain Sourav Ganguly.
“We’ve to still decide who will run the cricket franchise, it may be the people who are involved with football franchise or it may not,” Goenka said.
Goenka’s New Rising, by way of the negative bid, will now pay the BCCI Rs. 16 crore for ownership of the team for 2016 and 2017 season.
“They won’t take a single penny from the BCCI. In fact they will pay the BCCI,” Board Secretary Anurag Thakur told reporters after a meeting of the IPL Governing Council at the Taj Hotel in the Capital.
Comments
0 comment