Pro Kabaddi League announces list of retained players

Mumbai (Maharashtra) [India], August 6 (ANI): The Pro Kabaddi League (PKL) announced the ‘Elite Retained Players’, ‘Retained Young Players’ and ‘Existing New Young Players’ for Season 11 on Tuesday.

Each of the franchises has retained a strong core group of players and is looking to build stronger units in the season 11 player auction, as per a PKL press release.

Dabang Delhi KC have retained their raider duo of Ashu Malik and Naveen Kumar. Meanwhile, the ‘Most Valuable Player’ award winner in Season 10 – Aslam Inamdar has been retained by Puneri Paltan. Furthermore, the Jaipur Pink Panthers have retained their star raider Arjun Deshwal.

A total of 88 players were retained across three categories with 22 from the Elite Retained Players (ERP) category, 26 in the Retained Young Players (RYP) category and 40 in the Existing New Young Players (ENYP). The non-retained players, which include star players such as Pawan Sehrawat, Pardeep Narwal, Maninder Singh, Fazel Atrachali and Mohammadreza Shadloui Chiyaneh will go under the hammer at the PKL Season 11 Player Auction from August 15-16, 2024 in Mumbai.

The Domestic and Overseas players will be divided into four categories at the PKL Season 11 Player Auction: Category A, B, C and D. The players will be further sub-divided as ‘All-Rounders’, ‘Defenders’ and ‘Raiders’ within each category.

The base prices for each of the categories are Category A – Rs 30 Lakh, Category B – Rs 20 Lakh, Category C – Rs 13 Lakh, Category D – Rs 9 Lakh. The Season 11 Player Pool will consist of 500-plus including the 24 players from the two finalist teams of the Khelo India University Games 2024. The total Salary Purse available to each franchise for its squad is Rs 5 crore.

In March this year, the mighty Puneri Paltan bested a young and resilient Haryana Steelers to lift their first-ever Pro Kabaddi League (PKL) trophy.

In what was an exciting finale that could have gone either way, a guided performance from the Puneri Paltan took them to the trophy with a 28-25 victory over the Steelers at the GMC Balayogi Stadium in Hyderabad.