IPL Players' draft: All eyes on MS Dhoni, 12.5 crore, Pune

New Delhi: For two new Indian Premier League (IPL) franchises, Pune and Rajkot, Tuesday is going to be a big day, as they will participate in Players' draft to pick core team members from suspended franchises Chennai Super Kings (CSK) and Rajasthan Royals (RR).

The biggest question is, will Pune franchise, who has the advantage to pick the first player, spend 12.5 crore to pick India's limited-over skipper MS Dhoni over rest of the players?

Many of the armchair critics are of the view that Dhoni is still the biggest brand in the slam-bang version of the game and should be picked over the others, who are at disposal.

The other cricketers who are set to hog the limelight tomorrow are Ravichandran Ashwin, Ravindra Jadeja, Steven Smith, Shane Watson, Brendon McCullum, Dwayne Bravo, Suresh Raina, Ajinkya Rahane.

Each side can pick five players each. The first capped player for both teams will be commanding a price of Rs.12.5 crore and the remaining four will be picked up for Rs.9.5 crore, Rs.7.5 crore, Rs.5.5 crore and Rs.4 crore, respectively.

Uncapped players can be picked for a stipulated fee of Rs.4 crore.

Last week, Sanjiv Goenka’s group New Rising had pocketed the bid for the Pune franchise and Intex won the bid for Rajkot in a reverse-bidding process.