Rajasthan Royals are out with their list of retained and released players ahead of the IPL 2019 auctions and there aren’t too many big surprises. Jaydev Unadkat, who was bought for a whopping 11.5 crore by the franchise in the last auctions is the biggest casualty as he has been released by the team.

Australian opening batsman D’Arcy Short is the big name among the international players who have received the boot from the franchise.

Former captain Steven Smith, who missed the last season after being banned by Cricket Australia for his role in the ball tampering controversy, has been retained by the franchise.

In a press release the winners of the first edition of the IPL said, “With a lot of back and forth and deliberations on the vision ahead for the Royals, the team decided to release Australian batsman D’Arcy Short along with right-arm fast-medium bowler Ben Laughlin and South African Wicketkeeper-Batsman Heinrich Klaasen.”

“Besides this, the South African fast-medium bowler Dane Paterson and the Chinaman Zahir Khan from Afghanistan along with Dushmantha Chameera from Sri Lanka have also been released.”

The Indian names released by the team are Jaydev Unadkat, Anureet Singh, Ankit Sharma and Jatin Saxena.

Here is the full list of players retained by the franchise:

Retained Indian players: Ajinkya Rahane, Krishnappa Gowtham, Sanju Samson, Shreyas Gopal, Aryaman Birla, S. Midhun, Prashant Chopra, Stuart Binny, Rahul Tripathi, Dhawal Kulkarni, Mahipal Lomror

Retained International players: Jos Buttler, Ben Stokes, Steve Smith, Jofra Archer, Ish Sodhi

First Published: Nov 15, 2018 18:40 IST