Pune and Rajkot today became the new franchises in the Indian Premier League (IPL), replacing the suspended teams of Chennai Super Kings and Rajasthan Royals for a period of two years.
The Pune franchise was bought by Kolkata-based business tycoon Sanjiv Goenka's company New Rising, while the Rajkot bid was won by Intex Mobiles.
While Goenka will shell out Rs 10 crore per year to the BCCI, Intex Mobiles will pay Rs 16 crore for the two-year deal.
"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 here.
The teams were sold through the reverse bidding process for which the base price was set at Rs 40 crore and bidders had to quote an amount less than that. The lowest bidder was given the franchises.
The process was necessitated by the suspension of CSK and RR for the involvement some of their officials and co-owners in the 2013 IPL spot-fixing scandal, which was probed by the Supreme Court-appointed Justice (retd) R M Lodha committee.
However, both the CSK and RR will be allowed back in the league after serving out their suspension.
The interim franchises, which have been picked today, will be participate in a draft to first retain their share of players.
Players from CSK and RR will be divided into two groups of capped and uncapped and the top names will be sold through the draft system. The two new teams will have a minimum of Rs 40 crore and a maximum of Rs 66 crore to buy their players.
The other three bidders in fray were Harsh Goenka of RPG properties, Axis Clinical and Chettinad Cement, all of whom quoted higher bids than New Rising and Intex Mobiles.
The vastly improved Jasprit Bumrah will need to step up
and give adequate support to the likes of Anderson, Tim Southee, Mitchell McClenaghan and Marchant de Lange.
In spin, MI will bank immensely on their experienced off spinner Harbhajan Singh. The feisty sardar, ignored by the Indian think-tank right through the WT20 campaign although he was part of the 15-strong squad, would be eager to show his mettle against Dhoni and company.
Supergiants, on the other hand, appear to have a strong batting line-up with the likes of Ajinkya Rahane, Kevin Pietersen, Steve Smith, Mitchell Marsh and Francois du Plessis present in it, along with Dhoni.
They have a good set of all-rounders such as Albie Morkel and Irfan Pathan and a good mix of pace and spin in the bowling attack which is expected to be led by Ishant Sharma and Ravichandran Ashwin respectively.
The mini-battle between off-spin rivals Ashwin and Harbhajan should also liven up the contest.
Australian leggie Adam Zampa is also there to be called upon along with Ashwin's Tamil Nadu teammate Murugan Ashwin, who is also a wrist spinner, and left arm slow bowler Ankit Sharma of Madhya Pradesh.
The key for the Supergiants will be about how fast and how well they can jell as a team.
Teams:
Rising Pune Supergiants: M S Dhoni (Capt), Ajinkya Rahane, Kevin Pietersen, Faf du Plessis, Steve Smith, Mitchell Marsh, Jaskaran Singh, Ravichandran Ashwin, Ankit Sharma, Albie Morkel, Irfan Pathan, Ishant Sharma, Ishwar Pandey, Thisara Perera, Saurabh Tiwary, R P Singh, Rajat Bhatia, Ankush Bains, Baba Aparajith, Murugan Ashwin, Ashok Dinda, Deepak Chahar, Scott Boland, Peter Handscomb, Adam Zampa.
Mumbai Indians: Rohit Sharma (Capt), Lendl Simmons, Parthiv Patel, Kieron Pollard, Ambati Rayudu, Hardik Pandya, Harbhajan Singh, Corey Anderson, Mitchell McClenaghan, Jos Buttler, Unmukt Chand, Marchant de Lange, Siddhesh Lad, Jasprit Bumrah, Shreyas Gopal, Tim Southee, Jagadeesha Suchith, R Vinay Kumar, Krunal Pandya, Nathu Singh, Akshay Wakhare, Nitish Rana, Jitesh Sharma, Kishore Kamath, Deepak Punia.
The match commences at 8 PM tomorrow.
