Kolkata Knight Riders team retained a total of 6 players for IPL 2025. But the surprising thing was that Shreyas Iyer’s name was not in this list. Shreyas Iyer had made Kolkata Knight Riders the champion under his captaincy last season. But KKR has now released him. Ever since the announcement of the retention list, there is a question in everyone’s mind that why did the last Kolkata Knight Riders not retain the champion captain? Now KKR CEO Venky Mysore has given a big statement on this issue.
Why did KKR not retain Shreyas Iyer?
According to Kolkata Knight Riders CEO Venky Mysore, Shreyas Iyer was among the top retentions of KKR for the next season of IPL. But due to lack of mutual consent, Shreyas Iyer’s name was not included in the retention list. Let us tell you, Kolkata Knight Riders had included Shreyas Iyer in their team before IPL 2022 and also made him the captain. At the same time, he could not play in 2023 due to injury. In the year 2024, he returned to the KKR team as captain and also won the title.
KKR CEO told the inside story
KKR CEO Venky Mysore said in an interview to Rev Sports, ‘The interesting thing about retention is that there are many aspects and forces involved in it. But the fundamental thing for retention is that most people sometimes do not understand that it is a matter of mutual consent. This is not a unilateral right that a franchisee has. The player also has to consider and agree on many factors. Venky Mysore further said, ‘Sometimes a consensus cannot be reached due to various reasons. Because of money or someone wants to test their worth or whatever. Ultimately this also affects the decision, but Shreyas Iyer was number one on our list.
Let us tell you, there was speculation about Shreyas Iyer’s separation from Kolkata Knight Riders for the last several days. Then reports claimed that money was the main reason behind Shreyas Iyer’s separation. Cricbuzz had said in one of its reports that KKR decided to release Shreyas Iyer from the team due to his demand for higher salary. Now Venky Mysore has just pointed towards this in his interview. Shreyas Iyer was bought by Kolkata Knight Riders in the IPL 2022 auction for Rs 12.25 crore, and this time he wanted a higher salary than this.
