Daily Briefing: The MI magic behind IPL 2025 retentions

🚨Big Story

On Thursday, the 10 Indian Premier League franchises announced their list of retained players. This comes ahead of the mega-auction and a fresh three-year cycle, starting with the IPL 2025 edition.

Core strength, tight: How the Mumbai Indians (MI) held on to their most sought-after stars after a nightmarish season is a fascinating IPL retention story. In a nutshell, what worked for MI to retain its best was a bunch of wounded players keen to bring back glory to the city that won five IPL titles so far.

The order of retention – with fine balance and nuanced signalling – looks like this on paper:

• The world’s best all-format bowler Jasprit Bumrah is the most valuable player with the highest retention pay (Rs 18 crore).
• The two captains – Hardik Pandya for MI last season and Suryakumar Yadav for India’s T20Is – are on par at Rs 16.35 crore.
• As for Rohit Sharma, who retired from T20 cricket after leading India to the T20 World Cup, gets Rs 16.30 crore.

Calling the shots: Now, it was Rohit who made the complex task of grading their equally important players easier for the franchise, as per sources involved in MI retention discussions. Three from the core group– Rohit, Surya and Hardik–agreed that Bumrah had to be the top retention player. A string of honest conversations, large-heartedness of players and a consensus among players of putting collective goals ahead of team hierarchy seems to have paid off.

Big let-go(s): Among the skippers, Delhi Capitals’ Rishabh Pant, and KL Rahul who captained LSG since their inception, Royal Challengers Bengaluru’s Faf du Plessis and Kolkata Knight Riders’ Shreyas Iyer are back in the auction pool. Iyer led the Knight Riders to the IPL 2024 title, with the now-Indian coach Gautam Gambhir in tow.

RCB’s hopes up: RCB has opted to retain Virat Kohli for the next three-year cycle, making him the most expensive Indian retention at Rs 21 crore. In an emotional message to fans, he spelt out the targets for the franchise, starting with winning the title “at least once”. Kohli, per media reports, is set to return as captain of the IPL franchise he’s played for since 2008.

P.S. Chennai Super Kings (CSK) fans can rest easy and gear up for Thala as MS Dhoni has been retained for Rs 4 crore under the new uncapped player rule.

⚡Only in Express

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This is what Prime Minister Narendra Modi said at the National Unity Day celebrations in Gujarat on Thursday, where he called for a “secular civil code” to “eliminate discrimination” and strengthen unity.

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⏳ And Finally…

‘Sleep with your camera on’

The staging is elaborate: a backdrop resembling a police station; high-profile names dropped on the go; central investigative agencies, and even the Supreme Court invoked. The fear is the weapon: The threats range from arrests to jail time, and sometimes to life itself. But what’s all this for? This is a key pattern that has emerged in investigations into cyber fraud cases.

That’s all for today.

Until tomorrow
Vibha B Madhava and Ayesha