Rishabh Pant will lead Delhi Capitals (DC) in the Indian Premier League (IPL) 2022 as their former captain Shreyas Iyer has parted ways with the franchise. The Delhi-based franchise has gone ahead with prodigious opener Prithvi Shaw, all-rounder Axar Patel and South African speedster Anrich Nortje ahead of IPL 2022 mega auctions.
Players Retained
Rishabh Pant
The skipper is right on top and was the first name which is retained by the franchise. In his early days as captain, the wicketkeeper-batter had done an exceptional job for the Capitals as they had made the qualifiers last season. Pant has been retained for Rs 16 crore.
Axar Patel
Bit surprising that Delhi’s owners went with the left-arm spinner Axar over the veteran off-spinner Ravichandran Ashwin. The left-arm spinner has been retained for Rs 9 crore after negotiations with the player.
Prithvi Shaw
The prolific opener was instrumental in the success of his side in recent years and the faith has been again shown on the right-handed batter. On his day, the 22-year-old can destroy the biggest bowling attacks in world cricket. The Mumbai-born opener has been retained for Rs 7.5 crore.
Anrich Nortje
The South African speedster was critical in changing the fortunes of Capitals in the past couple of years. If the management had earlier decided to retain only one overseas player in the squad, it had to be Nortje considering his impact in the bowling line-up. The speedster has been retained for Rs 6.5 crore.
Remaining purse - Rs 51 crore
Players Released
Shreyas Iyer, Ravichandran Ashwin, Shikhar Dhawan, Kagiso Rabada, Shimron Hetmyer, Steve Smith, Ajinkya Rahane, Sam Billings, Ripal Patel, Vishnu Vinod, Marcus Stoinis, Tom Curran, Lalit Yadav, Avesh Khan, Amit Mishra, Umesh Yadav, Ishant Sharma, Praveen Dubey, Ben Dwarshuis, Lukman Meriwala, Chris Woakes, Kulwant Khejroliya, Manimaran Siddharth
Notable exclusions
Despite playing good cricket in the last couple of seasons, Delhi Capitals are still searching for their maiden IPL title. The franchise appointed Rishabh Pant as their skipper for the 2021 edition in the absence of Shreyas Iyer who also took the capitals in the finals of the IPL 2020 during his captaincy tenure.
Iyer had missed the first phase of the 2021 season which was held in India but came back in the second phase which took place in the United Arab Emirates (UAE). However, the franchise decided to continue with Pant as the leader of the pack.
It was a certain indication that the franchise was looking towards Pant as their captain in the years to come and keeping that in mind the decision was taken. It was clear that DC won’t look for Iyer’s services going forward in the further editions.
Nonetheless, that was inevitable and the former captain Iyer isn’t retained by the capitals.
The likes of Iyer, Ashwin, Kagiso Rabada, Shimron Hetmyer, Marcus Stoinis, Shikhar Dhawan despite performing exceptionally well in the past seasons have not been retained by their former team.
