Thanos would be proud of the proceedings of the IPL 2026 auction.
All 77 slots were filled up, each franchise went with their squads reading 25/25, and the same franchise that kicked the auction off, Delhi
Capitals, with a Rs. 2 crore contract for David Miller, ended it with a Rs. 2 crore signing of Kyle Jamieson: perfectly balanced, as all things should be.
Even beyond the quirky aesthetics, it was an auction that showed the growth of the league. You would really need to squint to find any Indian players who deserved to be picked but weren’t.
When there used to be battles for overseas stars with one or two recently good performances, six of the ten teams went head-to-head for Kartik Sharma and Prashant Veer — the two uncapped players with not much to show on their official stats.
It showed that all went deep into the T20 leagues of Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh — it seems obvious and the bare minimum now, but it was reserved for only a few top scouting teams until a couple of years ago.
Eventually, Chennai Super Kings (CSK) made them the joint most expensive uncapped signings in IPL history, and their personal highest for the event, showing their development from a team obsessed with experience, to one ready to take bets on unknown names with the potential to play for the country one day.
As many as ten uncapped players became crorepatis — four of them earned more than Rs. 4 crore, one more than the mega auction last year. Although he went unsold, there was a player, Izaz Sawariya, who came into the auction after grabbing attention by sharing his best reels on social media.
When overseas players were picked, teams like DC and Sunrisers Hyderabad did well to look beyond the obvious numbers and ended up with steals like Ben Duckett and Jack Edwards, respectively.
“Every year, the IPL is evolving and becoming more mature as a franchise-based league,” DC co-owner Parth Jindal said. “Scouting has become a very large part of the IPL, and because of that, a few names were already known to all of us even before the auction as players who were going to go for big money. Whether it was Kartik Sharma or Aqib Nabi Dar, there were so many of them.”
“The IPL is where young players coming through domestic cricket make a name for themselves and then go on to play for India. What may be unknown entities for the general public are actually very well-known to all 10 franchises. Everyone is gunning for talent they believe will be the next big thing, and I’m sure some of them will break out over the next one or two years and even make their debuts for Team India,” he added.
There are always winners and losers of an auction, but this time it seemed there were more winners than losers. Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) had the highest budget, and made sure not to limit themselves by the true value of a player: for example, they could have easily felt Matheesha Pathirana was not worth more than Rs. 15 crore because of his form last season, but rightly overpaid because they could. The same was true for Mustafizur Rahman.
Mumbai Indians (MI) needed only one key fix: a backup for Ryan Rickelton, which in itself is an ode to their excellent business beforehand, and played no-risk with Quinton de Kock. They didn’t have the usual might to do much else, but kept the environment cordial with that cheeky early bid for Cameron Green, who would become the most-expensive buy of the auction at 25.20 crore, ten times MI’s available purse.
CSK’s overseas choices could be questioned, but they can’t be blamed for trying something novel. Similarly, Rajasthan Royals, Royal Challengers Bengaluru, and Punjab Kings can’t be blamed for any of their picks — which should make the IPL much more competitive in the coming season.
The still relatively new sides, Gujarat Titans (GT), and Lucknow Super Giants (LSG) had arguably the most middling time at the event. GT didn’t have much to do for most of the auction, and their picks weren’t inspiring, especially considering they came to the auction with major gaps only in the middle-order and ended up signing two more fast-bowlers who would probably not play.
LSG, on the other hand, felt like that one team that tries a lot but, due to bad combinations of budget and opponent bids, just couldn’t get their first-choice options. They indeed ended up with a ton of second-choice ones, and the most valuable lessons to take home on how to navigate mini auctions.
