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Rishabh Pant wasn’t retained by Delhi Capitals with the franchise keeping hold of Axar Patel, Kuldeep Yadav, Tristan Stubbs and Abishek Porel.
Rishabh Pant will be a hot property at the IPL mega auctions. (PTI Photo)
Rishabh Pant’s exit from Delhi Capitals certainly was one of the major talking points as the IPL teams announced their retentions before the mega auctions. The unexpected development was months in the making with Pant making an ’emotional’ decision to opt against being retained and instead enter the auctions.
According to a report in The Times of India, Pant and the current DC management weren’t on the same page as far as the future direction of the franchise is concerned. The wicketkeeper-batter joined DC in 2016 and has had an eight-year-long association with them.
The two parties held talks to reach a common ground before Pant decided to part ways on “good terms”.
“It was a very emotional moment for all the stakeholders. Pant has been an integral part of the franchise since he was first bought in 2016. The owners and Pant didn’t want this relationship to end easily. So, they kept trying till the end. But Pant decided that he would rather leave on good terms and be a bone of contention,” TOI quoted a source as saying.
As per the report, Pant wasn’t kept in the loop as DC named Hemang Badani as the new head coach and Venugopal Rao as director of cricket.
“The GMR group was the sole owner of the team when Pant was bought in 2016. They share a very fond relationship with Pant. But Pant expected a greater role in the franchise which was agreed upon in Aug. But somehow that wasn’t translating into anything,” the source said.
Pant played 111 games for DC and scored 3284 runs in them at a strike-rate of 148.31. He struck one century and 18 half-centuries. He’s reportedly been contacted by a host of franchises who may plan their auction strategies keeping the star India cricketer in mind.
DC picked Axar Patel as their first retention for Rs 16.50 crore with Kuldeep Yadav second at Rs 13.25 crore. South African Tristan Stubbs has been retained for Rs 10 crore while uncapped Abishek Porel for Rs 4 crore.
