Kolkata Knight Riders broke the bank to get back Venkatesh Iyer, spending a record Rs 23.75 crore (Rs 237.5 million) on the Madhya Pradesh all-rounder at the IPL mega auction.
Having released title winning captain Shreyas Iyer, KKR went in with a clear mindset to get back Venkatesh at all costs, with likely plans to hand him the captaincy for IPL 2025.
KKR retained most of their players from last season including Rinku Singh, Sunil Narine, Andre Russell, Harshit Rana, Varun Chakaravarthy and Ramandeep Singh, as a major chunk of their auction went into these retentions.
They also spent Rs 6.5 crore (Rs 65 million) to get South African speedster Anrich Nortje, their biggest buy after Venkatesh. Quinton de Kock at Rs 3.60 crore (Rs 36 million) is a steal and so is West Indies T20 captain Rovman Powell at Rs 1.50 crore (Rs 15 million).
They added some experience to their line-up with seniors Ajinkya Rahane and Moeen Ali.
KKR could be the perfect set-up for someone like Umran Malik to get his career back on track after he played just one match last season at Sunrisers Hyderabad.
He joins a strong pace bowling unit featuring Nortje, Harshit Rana, Vaibhav Arora, Spencer Johnson and Russell.
With two world class spinners in Sunil Narine and Varun Chakravarathy, a power-packed batting line-up and a solid pace attack, champions KKR look like the most complete squad heading into IPL 2025.
IPL 2025: KKR Squad:
Total players: 21
Overseas Players: 8
