Rajasthan Royals head coach Rahul Dravid has revealed that captain Sanju Samson had a significant role to play in zeroing in the team’s retention strategy ahead of the upcoming Indian Premier League 2025 season.
Samson, along with opener Yashasvi Jaiswal, all-rounder Riyan Parag, wicketkeeper-batter Dhruv Jurel, finisher Shimron Hetmyer and medium pacer Sandeep Sharma were retained by the Royals.
Besides reigning champions Kolkata Knight Riders, the Royals were the only other team to use the maximum quota of retentions for IPL 2025.
Samson, who has captained the team for the last four seasons, was the obvious first pick.
“Sanju Samson is our batsman, wicketkeeper and captain. He has been the captain of this team for many years. So, it was a no-brainer for us to retain him as he will be our captain in the future too. He was a top retainer pick for us and was very involved in our decision process as well," Rahul Dravid revealed to JioCinema.
In the process, the Royals had to release some star performers like Ravichandran Ashwin, Jos Buttler and Yuzvendra Chahal among others, who will now enter the IPL 2025 auction pool.
“Sanju Samson played a big role in the retention, and it was difficult for him as well. As a captain, he has built a lot of relationships with the players. He has had a lot of balanced views about this,” Dravid stated, underlining the difficult decisions the team had to make to zero in on the final six.
"He has taken the trouble to understand the dynamics of it, the pros and cons of this. So, I would like to praise him for discussing this with us. It was not an easy decision for us either,” the Royals head coach added.
A full set of six retentions does eat into the Rajasthan Royals’ final budget for the IPL 2025 auction but Dravid remains confident that retaining the core of the team far outweighs the shortcomings of a curtailed war chest.
"There is definitely a stability when you retain six players. We could only retain six players, but if we could have done more, we would have retained more for sure. We have built a foundation for us, we have created a base, we have retained a core, we will take this forward and fill it and make a good squad," the Indian cricket legend said.
Rajasthan Royals won the inaugural IPL season in 2008 but are yet to reclaim the title since.
“For the next season, the expectation will be that we qualify and win. It's been many years since Rajasthan has won a title. So, our effort will be to win, but we also understand that there are very good teams in IPL," Dravid said, declaring the team’s ambitions for the upcoming season.
