On Friday, December 23, Kochi will host the auction for the 2023 Indian Premier League (IPL). After finishing 9th in the IPL 2022 season and not qualifying for the Playoffs stage, the MS Dhoni-led Chennai Super Kings, four-time champions, will need to rebuild and regroup. The Chennai team must fill a significant void left by the retirement of all-rounder Dwayne Bravo from the IPL.

After Bravo and Robin Uthappa left the team, CSK still has Rs 20.45 crore to spend on the IPL 2023 auction. The current JioCinema expert panel for the upcoming IPL 2023 auction will now include the former CSK batter. Sam Curran, an England all-rounder who played for CSK in the IPL 2021 tournament, will be high on MS Dhoni’s list for the IPL 2023 auction.

During the IPL 2023 Player Auction on December 23, Uthappa discussed the players Kolkata Knight Riders and Chennai Super Kings would consider

“KKR would be looking for three players in this auction – one would be an Indian backup wicketkeeper for (Rahmanullah) Gurbaz. In case, they want flexibility in playing both Tim Southee and Lockie Ferguson, Gurbaz is the one who would have to sit out as they are not going to drop Sunil Narine and Andre Russell. Second player is a backup to Andre Russell. IPL is going back to its original format. So, it is not going to be just one or two venues,

” Uthappa said in a release ahead of the auction.

Highest score of 5️⃣5️⃣* and best bowling figures of 4️⃣/1️⃣1️⃣ 🔥🔥

All eyes 👀 will be on Sam Curran during the #TATAIPLAuction 2023! Which team will win the bidding war though 🤔 pic.twitter.com/VDBzB6Vh1X

— IndianPremierLeague (@IPL) December 20, 2022

“There will be a lot of travel. KKR is one such team that travels the most. Kolkata is really far away and they travel at least 2-3 thousand kms more than all other teams. So, keeping those things in mind, you will have to have a backup just in case, Russell pulls up or he has not recovered due to back-to-back matches. Third would be an Indian fast bowler who would be a back up to Shardul Thakur and Umesh Yadav. They have a couple of youngsters in their group, but they would like to get somebody like Jaydev Unadkat,”

Uthappa added.

Uthappa also spoke about Chennai Super Kings’ expected buys. 

“CSK hey need an all-rounder to replace Dwayne Bravo and they need a solid India middle-order batter as a backup for the players that they already have. In that, I think they will look for the likes of Sam Curran because he has already played for CSK in the past, he’s done well for them and has contributed to their success so they will definitely try and go for him. The second one would be an Indian batter in the middle order and the ones that are available in this auction seem to be like Manish Pandey, he has done exceptionally well in the IPL and is also someone who is experienced and would really enjoy playing in the CSK culture. These are the two players they will go for but in case they don’t get them – I am certain there are other options that they already have,”

he concluded

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CSK’s retained squad: MS Dhoni (captain), Shivam Dube, Rajvardhan Hangargekar, Dwaine Pretorius, Mitchell Santner, Devon Conway, Ruturaj Gaikwad, Ambati Rayudu, Subhranshu Senapati, Moeen Ali, Ravindra Jadeja, Tushar Deshpande, Mukesh Chowdhary, Matheesha Pathirana, Simarjeet Singh, Deepak Chahar, Prashant Solanki, Maheesh Theekshana

Purse left: Rs. 20.45