IPL 2024 Auction: From Karun Nair to Dhawal Kulkarni, capped Indian players who could go unsold

The Indian Premier League (IPL) player auction ahead of the 2024 season is just around the corner. The IPL mini-auction will be held in Dubai on 19 December, and this will be the first time the auction is held outside India. A total of 1166 players have registered for the auction, out of which 830 of them are Indians. While there will be some focus on upcoming talent in the IPL auction as it is meant to be, some prominent capped Indian players were released by their franchises ahead of the IPL players’ retention and release deadline on 26 November. And quite a few of them will go under the hammer on 19 December.

IPL 2024 Auction: Mitchell Starc, Travis Head, Rachin Ravindra register; no Jofra Archer

Some of them to have been released by franchises have showcased exceptional talent in the IPL previously, but lack of form and consistency have hindered their progress.

IPL 2024 auction: List of players with Rs 2 crore, Rs 1.5 crore and Rs 1 crore base price

We take a look at five such players who could go unsold at the IPL 2024 auction:

Karun Nair

Karun Nair has not had an international cricket career thus far, and his numbers in the recent seasons of the IPL does not look promising either. In the IPL 2022 auction, Karun was sold to Rajasthan Royals (RR) for a price of Rs 1.40 crore, but failed to justify his price tag, scoring just 16 runs from three games he played that season.

In IPL 2023, Karun Nair was named in as replacement for the injured KL Rahul at Lucknow Super Giants (LSG), but failed to get a game this season, eventually being released by the franchise.

Although he has scored three fifties across domestic competitions in the last three months, there is nothing substantial enough for the 31-year-old to be capable enough of firing with the bat, and as a result, he is at risk going unsold in the IPL auction.

Kedar Jadhav

Kedar Jadhav’s base price of Rs 2 crore might be a bit too much for teams to ask for. Although he has regularly played in the IPL over the years, his role in the playing XI has been limited.

In the 2023 IPL auction, Kedar Jadhav had gone unsold, and was only snapped up by RCB midway through IPL 2023 as an injury replacement for David Willey.

The all-rounder played just two games for RCB earlier this year, and managed just a dozen of runs. His previous best overall rans tally in the season of an IPL was in IPL 2017, when Jadhav, playing for RCB, finished with 267 runs from 13 matches.

Hanuma Vihari

Between 2013 and now, Hanuma Vihari has played just three seasons in the IPL (2013, 2015 and 2019). Vihari represented Sunrisers Hyderabad (SRH) in IPL 2013, scoring 241 runs from 17 matches, and that remains his best season with the bat.

Over the years, Vihari has gone onto become synonymous with being a Test specialist. In the recent Syed Mushtaq Ali T20 trophy, Vihari managed to score 229 runs from seven matches, but that too just included an unbeaten knock of 84 and 24 for Andhra Pradesh against Manipur and Gujarat respectively, apart from a knock of 49 against Arunachal Pradesh.

Vihari, however, has struggled for consistency, enduring four single figure scores in 10 outings across competitions while scoring just two fifties in this period.

Varun Aaron

Much like a few players in this list, Varun Aaron’s role in the IPL has dried up over the years. He started off his IPL career being in huge demand for franchises.

Across the first three seasons he played in, between 2011 and 2014, Aaron picked up 26 wickets, but the last time he even crossed a five-wicket mark in the IPL was in 2017, when he turned up for Kings XI Punjab (Now Punjab Kings).

Varun Aaron was part of Gujarat Titans’ title-winning squad in IPL 2022, but had to fight hard for his place in the playing XI and ended up playing just two matches and taking as many wickets.

Dhawal Kulkarni

Back in 2008, Dhawal Kulkarni began his IPL career with a flourish with Mumbai Indians (MI), but if his recent seasons are to go by, one may feel that the 34-year-old is past his prime. Over the years, Kulkarni has gone onto play for MI and Rajasthan Royals, but his last season in the IPL was three years back, in 2020, when he was acquired by MI for Rs 75 lakh after spending a couple of seasons with RR.

In the 2020 season, however, Kulkarni ended up playing just one game for MI, against Sunrisers Hyderabad in Sharjah, but ended up getting hit on the helmet while batting. Later, on, Kulkarni would go onto register figures of 0/22 from three overs in the same match.

It is clear that Kulkarni has gone out of favour in the last few years in IPL and went unsold in the IPL 2023 auction that was held in Kochi in December 2022.