Rajasthan Royals decided to let go of Ben Stokes and Jofra Archer. (BCCI/IPL) Rajasthan Royals on Tuesday revealed a list of retained players ahead of the Indian Premier League 2022 Auction. The franchise retained two Indians and one overseas player in the form of their influential skipper Sanju Samson, uncapped fearless young batter Yashasvi Jaiswal, along with England’s talismanic star Jos Buttler.
Having appointed Sanju Samson as their leader before the 2021 season, the Royals have chosen the mercurial batter as the first retained player, with Rs 14 crores coming off their purse.
The Royals’ second retained player at a cost of Rs 10 crores is the 50-over World Cup-winning Englishman, Jos Buttler, who is considered by many as the best T20I batter in the world currently.
Uncapped 19-year-old Yashasvi Jaiswal became the second-youngest player ever to be retained across all IPL teams before the mega auction, with the youngest being Jaiswal’s current skipper at the Royals – Sanju Samson, who was retained at the age of 19 years and 2 months by the franchise in 2014.
Director of Cricket, Kumar Sangakkara spoke on the approach behind the retention, “We had to take a lot of factors into consideration while making this decision and would have ideally liked to have gone with four players but the uncertainty surrounding Jofra’s long term injury forced us to retain only three. The idea behind going with these players was to have a strong core retained who also happen to form the leadership team at the Royals, while also giving us spending power in the auction. It was certainly a tough decision to make, but we are delighted to confirm that Sanju, Jos, and Yashasvi will be staying with us as the backbone of our team. We believe that this trio of explosive players are the best to take this team forward, and have the desired qualities that we are looking for in our players as we look forward to the next season. We would also like to thank all of the players for their efforts through the course of the previous seasons, and for always maintaining the Rajasthan Royals values.”
Sangakkara also explained why the Royals think tank decided to let go of Ben Stokes and Jofra Archer.
“We had to take a lot of factors into consideration while making the decision and would have ideally liked to have gone with four players but the uncertainty surrounding Jofra’s long-term injury forced us to retain only three,” the former Sri Lankan skipper said.
🚨 An update on Ben & Jofra. 👇#RoyalsFamily | #IPLRetention | @KumarSanga2 pic.twitter.com/mXZ1xLJ7EM
— Rajasthan Royals (@rajasthanroyals) November 30, 2021
Both Stokes and Archer missed the UAE leg of IPL 2021 in the United Arab Emirates through injury, with Stokes also saying his absence was to help protect his mental health.
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