3 Reasons Why KKR Must Not Release Shreyas Iyer Ahead of IPL 2025 Mega Auction
With the return of their most successful captain Gautam Gambhir as the team’s mentor, with the return of their captain Shreyas Iyer from back injury, Kolkata Knight Riders also returned to top of the podium as they won their 3rd ever Indian Premier League (IPL) Trophy in IPL 2024.
It was a season full of success for the Knight Riders. Gautam Gambhir’s successful return saw him win his 3rd IPL with KKR, 2 as captain and 1 as mentor. With Gambhir’s return, Sunil Narine became a success while opening for the Knight Riders.
But, among all the success, the biggest success for the Kolkata Knight Riders was the return of their captain Shreyas Iyer, who missed the IPL 2023 season due to back injury as Nitish Rana was made the captain for the season where they missed out on the playoffs. But in 2024, it was a dominant season for the Kolkata Knight Riders, where they finished top of the table with 20 points and crushed Sunrisers Hyderabad in the Final.
Shreyas Iyer initially struggled with the bat but found his groove later in the season and played a valuable role as a batter and captain to guide KKR to their 3rd title. With the Mega Auction looming large, the KKR fans are particularly quite devastated as their super team could be broken apart. Fans have been asking for Shreyas Iyer to be retained no matter what and we take a look at some reason KKR must retain Shreyas Iyer before IPL 2025 Mega Auction.
Great Middle-order Batter
As mentioned above, although Shreyas Iyer struggled at the start of the season, the India international batter found his groove as the season progressed. The 29-years-old KKR captain scored 351 runs in 14 innings with a strike rate of 146.86 and average of 39.00. Iyer is a middle-order batter who mainly plays the anchor role, but is very capable of accelerating the inning at a quicker pace. And with Virat Kohli now retired from T20I, Shreyas Iyer could very much fight for that place in the Indian team.
Bidding War for Captains in IPL 2025 Mega Auction
A bidding war expected between several franchises in the IPL 2025 Mega Auction. Several teams are on the hunt for a leader for their team and there is no doubt that Shreyas Iyer is currently one of the best captaincy material. In case Shreyas Iyer finds himself in the mega auction, there is no doubt that teams like Lucknow, Bengaluru, Delhi, Punjab King could go big for the KKR’s IPL winning captain.
Shreyas Iyer is the rightful successor to Gautam Gambhir
There is no doubt that the former Indian cricket team’s opening batter, now the new Indian cricket head coach, Gautam Gambhir is the greatest captain for the Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) in their history. Gambhir is a legend for the team and its fans after the left-hand opening batter guided the team to 2 IPL Trophies in 3 season. Since then, KKR have had Dinesh Karthik and Eoin Morgan as their captain, but no one matched the standards set by Gambhir.
Although Iyer’s first season as captain of KKR was played in centralized venue due to COVID 19 and the team finished 7th, Iyer missed the 2023 season due to injury, but won the IPL Trophy in his 2nd season as the captain of team, something that KKR fans find akin to , who also won the IPL Trophy in his second season with the team.
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