Rishabh Pant Big Statement: When Delhi Capitals did not retain their captain Rishabh Pant ahead of the Indian Premier League (IPL) 2025 mega auction, legendary Indian cricketer speculated that there could've been "disagreement on the fees". On November 19, Star Sports posted a video of Gavaskar giving his opinion. India's swashbuckling wicketkeeper-batter Pant ended the speculations by saying that "it wasn't about the money".
"When KKR won last year (IPL 2024), Shreyas Iyer was the captain. As I said earlier for Rishabh Pant as well, at times, there could be a disagreement on the fees," Gavaskar said.
Gavaskar also predicted that DC may exercise their Right to Match (RTM) card to reacquire Pant's services.
"Delhi will want him because they will also need to find a captain if Rishabh Pant isn't in their team. So I feel Delhi will definitely try to use the RTM card or bring Rishabh Pant back into their team at the auction," he said.
Replying to the video on X, Pant wrote, "My retention wasn’t about the money for sure that I can say (white heart emoji)."
DC's retention and purse left
DC retained four players shaed of the auction. Their first pick was all-rounder Axar Patel (Rs 16.50 crore), left-arm chinaman bowler Kuldeep Yadav (Rs 13.25 crore), South Africa's Tristan Stubbs (Rs 10 crore) and uncapped wicketkeeper-batter Abishek Porel (Rs 4 crore). DC have Rs 73 crore left in the purse going into the auction. They can use RTM for two players in the mega auction.
Pant to break Starc's record for most expensive player
Meanwhile, former Indian all-rounder Irfan Pathan has predicted that Pant will break Australia's Mitchell Starc's record for most expensive player in IPL auction's history. Starc was picked for Rs 24.75 by KKR. However, Pant is expected to break Yuvraj Singh's record for most expensive Indian player in the auction.
