The Hindu : Sport : IPL: rules for the players’ auction

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Wednesday, Feb 20, 2008
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IPL: rules for the players’ auction

MUMBAI: The auction will be an open auction with each player being individually put up for bidding. There are around 78 players in the auction. Each player has an annual ‘base player fee’.

Each franchise has a total ‘purse’ of $5m that it can spend on the auction for players for 2008. Franchises will not be able to make a bid that would take them beyond this total purse.

Players in the auction will be arranged into ‘sets’ of approximately 12 according to their base player fee, their cricketing speciality and their expected availability for the 2008 season.

Interestingly, if a player who on the day of the auction is expected to be unavailable in 2008 subsequently becomes available (e.g. through retirement, non-selection by national team or tour cancellation) and provided he is able to obtain a No Objection Certificate for the 2008 season from his home board, may at the IPL’s discretion become part of the relevant franchise’s squad for that season.

Percentage availability

Franchises will be issued a list of players, the composition of sets and the order in which the sets will be auctioned.

For each player, the following information will be included: name, nationality, speciality, base player fee, and expected ‘percentage availability’ for the 2008 season. The minimum ‘percentage availability’ for any player included in the auction will be 25%.

Thus even if a player is expected to be either completely unavailable or only available for less than four of the matches in 2008, 25% of the fee bid for that player will count against the $5m purse. For example, a purchase price of $4,00,000 for a player, who is expected to be completely unavailable in 2008, will cause a deduction of $1,00,000 from the franchise’s overall $5m purse.

Bidders will raise a paddle to indicate a bid (only one official bidder per franchise). Each bid will represent the player fee per season to be paid by the franchise to the player for each season — 2008, 2009 and 2010 — ignoring any periods of unavailability. Once made, no bid may be withdrawn.

Bidding increments

Bidding increments will be as follows, bids up to $1,00,000 — increments of $5,000, bids from $1,00,000 to $2,50,000 — increments of $10,000, bids from $2,50,000 to $5,00,000 — increments of $25,000, bids in excess of $5,00,000 — increments at the auctioneer’s discretion.

Players for whom no bids are received when they are initially presented for auction will be placed in a final set and will be re-presented for auction once all of the initial sets have been concluded. Franchises may not buy foreign players in advance of the auction (whether such players are amongst the list of players to be auctioned or otherwise). After the auction, franchises are free to purchase additional foreign players subject to the franchises informing the BCCI / DLF IPL of any such additional foreign players. The BCCI / DLF IPL will approach the desired players on behalf of the franchise in an attempt to negotiate the contracted fee up to an amount set by the franchise, and will endeavour to obtain a NOC from that player’s home board.

If more than one franchise is interested in a particular player, the DLF IPL may hold a further auction to determine which franchise will sign that player. The fees paid to any such additional foreign players for 2008 (when added to the total player fees for 2008 committed by the franchise in the auction) must not exceed the maximum purse of $5m. Indian players who are not in the auction can be signed at any time.

The contract with the player will be for a fixed term of three years.

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