The players' auction for the inaugural season of Pro Kabaddi League, promoted by Mashal Sports, will be held in Mumbai on May 20 and would see 96 players from 13 countries going under the hammer for the eight franchises.
The auction would be hosted by Bob Hayton, who has over 30 years of auctioning experience, said a media release on behalf of the league set to be held in June-July.
Franchise teams representing Bangalore, Chennai, Delhi, Jaipur, Kolkata, Mumbai, Pune and Vishakapatnam would compete in the league.
All team owners have been mandated to build a team of 12 players from the three categories, A, B and C, that each of the 96 players are categorised into based on their prior records and achievements.
To have evenly balanced teams in the league, all owners would have to choose 4 Category 'A' players, 6 category 'B' players and 1 category 'C' player while the 12th and final player would be picked from a 'State Wild Card' pool.
The 32 category 'A' players will be auctioned in 4 lots; 8 raiders, followed by 8 defenders, 8 all-rounders and concludes with a mixed 8. The 48 Category 'B' players would also be auctioned in 4 lots of 12 each and out of the 12 players in category C, a total of 8 - one per team - would be allotted through a Double Draw system.
The state wild card player will be selected by the individual franchise based on recommendations of the state associations, the release said.
The owners of the franchises include, entrepreneur Ronnie Screwvala for Mumbai, the Future Group for Kolkata, Insurekot Sports (Kotak Group) for Pune, and Abhishek Bachchan for Jaipur.
The Pro Kabaddi league is set to kick off in Mumbai on July 26 with each of the 8 venues hosting 4 days of 'home' team action and all teams playing each other twice for a total of 14 league matches. The knock-out finale will be held in Bangalore between August 28 and 31 and these games would be telecast on Star Sports TV channel.
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