Sunrisers Eastern Cape’s former captain, Aiden Markram, has decided not to be retained for the upcoming season of SA20. Under Markram’s leadership, Sunrisers won the first two seasons of the tournament and ended up as the runner-up in the third edition.
According to a report in ESPNCricinfo, it was Markram who informed the franchise of his desire to head to auction. Markram is the leading run-scorer for the Sunrisers franchise and scored 967 runs in 36 games at an average of 34.53 and a strike rate of 131.38. He is one of the two players who have scored a century for the franchise in the league.
The auction for the upcoming edition of SA20 will take place on September 9. Franchises were allowed to retain or pre-sign not more than six players before the auction. The salary cap for this edition was increased from R39.1 million (US$2.2 million) to R41 million (US$2.31 million), and teams can sign one wildcard player whose fee is not included in the salary cap.
Sunrisers Eastern Cape Left With Two RTM Cards
Sunrisers retained Tristan Stubbs from their previous season’s squad and used their wild card for Marco Jansen. They pre-signed Jonny Bairstow, Allah Ghazanfar, and Adam Milne. This means they still have two RTM cards left, which they can use on Markram during the auction.
Markram played for Sunrisers Hyderabad from 2022 to 2024 before getting released before the IPL 2025 Auction. Lucknow Super Giants picked Markram in the auction for his base price of INR 2 crore. He scored 445 runs for the franchise in 13 games at a strike rate of 148.82. It was the first time Makram scored over 400 runs in a season of IPL.
Interestingly, the Super Giants’ owner has a team in SA20 as well, the Durban’s Super Giants. They pre-signed Sunil Narine and Jos Buttler and decided to retain Noor Ahmed from their last season’s squad. Super Giants might try to target Markram in the upcoming auction for the league.
Here’s The Complete List of Players Retained by Each Franchise
MI Cape Town
- Retained: Trent Boult, Rashid Khan, Ryan Rickleton, George Linde, Corbin Bosch
- Wild Card: Kagiso Rabada
- Pre-signing: Nicholas Pooran
- Sunrisers Eastern Cape
- Pre-signing: Jonny Bairstow, AM Ghazanfar, Adam Milne
- Retained: Tristan Stubbs
- Wild Card: Marco Jansen
Johannesburg Super Kings
- Retained: Faf du Plessis
- Wild Card: Donovan Ferreira
- Pre-signing: James Vince, Akeal Hosein, Richard Gleeson
- Pretoria Capitals
- Pre-signing: Will Jacks, Sherfane Rutherford
- Wild Card: Andre Russell
Paarl Royals
- Retentions: Lhuan-dre Pretorius, David Miller, Bjorn Fortuin
- Pre-signing: Sikandar Raza, Mujeeb-ur-Rahman
- Wild Card: Rubin Hermann
- Durban’s Super Giants
- Pre-signing: Sunil Narine, Jos Buttler
- Retained: Noor Ahmed
- Wild Card: Heinrich Klaasen
Leave a Comment