With the IPL auction taking place tomorrow, here's a mega-thread which will detail my thoughts both pre-auction on which skillsets/players each teams need & which players could fill those gaps, then moving on to live tweeting during the auction (this is going to be long!).

I’ve also discussed this in detail with the guys @The Cricket Pod and you can check out our podcast with video at .

It’s also available now (audio-only) via Spotify at https://open.spotify.com/episode/49ZQYvWM76EsXVwIqHrdeb?si=xh12QRFOQ3iswTsFQNkguQ.

Before I go any further, a small point of order. There’s a pretty high chance that I’ll criticise some team’s purchases tomorrow but that doesn’t necessarily mean that the player is a bad player.

It’s possible to be a good player & be both overpriced or lacking the particular skillset which that team requires. If I think a player is a poor signing then I will attempt to be evidence-based as to why that is my point of view.

Moving on, some thoughts about basic auction dynamics. With this being a mini-auction, teams are unlikely to go for an overhaul.

In my view, CSK could have attempted this route (particularly with their overseas players) but it’s important to point out that high-quality & proven domestic players are an extremely scarce resource at mini-auction.

We’ve seen numerous times previously that teams often take punts on players who have performed well recently at SMA/TNPL/KPL level, but I’d frequently question the expensive punts from players in these leagues - many of these don’t work out.

There are several factors for this - firstly, these picks are often weighted by recency bias and small data sample sizes which are often unsustainable long-term. Secondly, there is a huge quality gap between the IPL and lower level domestic T20 cricket - it’s a massive step up.

What surprised me was the high number of overseas retentions which teams made. There isn’t a lot of logical sense for this - teams should only retain players if they think it will cost more to buy them back at auction, and/or they offer an extremely rare skill-set.

On this basis, I’d question retentions for the likes of Bravo, Santner, Hazlewood, Hetmyer, Jordan, Seifert, Cummins, Miller, Stokes, Tye, Sams (swap) and Kane Richardson.

Again, as said, it’s not that they’re necessarily bad players, but they either don’t have rare skillsets or likely would be cheaper to buy back at auction.

With just one year to go until major auction this might also influence teams mindsets about their overseas picks - they could focus more on ‘finished article’ players & focus more on ‘upside’ players next year when they can pick them up cheaply and retain them for a 3-year cycle.

I actually hope that franchises don’t do this - there’s a ton of absurdly talented young players in the auction and I would love to see them get opportunities in the IPL over a number of the more established players who have much less upside who often get contracts.

With 22 overseas slots, what we also might see is some players surprisingly go unsold early on in the auction and then come back for round 2 bidding. There’s a lot of moving parts at auction/drafts so teams may be cautious early and then go back to options if the need dictates.

So, which players do each team need? For this I’m going to attempt to establish the skillsets which teams look deficient in and then suggest some options for them to try and fill those gaps.

The players I’m going to focus on for this will largely be overseas, because I anticipate the domestic market tomorrow to be extremely volatile and often make little logical sense, because teams could potentially overpay just to fill a specific gap due to lack of options.

CSK - Need an opener, another spinner and generally batters with more boundary-hitting intent. They had midrange batting/bowling boundary percentages, strong stability with the bat but need more boundary intent especially during middle overs.

They also had poor Powerplay batting output - hence the need to reinforce the opener slot (especially with the retirement of Shane Watson). They also had poor spin economy and have released Harbhajan & Chawla from their spin group.

With the spinners, I’d like to see SLA bowler Sai Kishore get more opportunities - numbers at lower levels are excellent.

However with 2 leg spinners and 3 SLA options they could arguably do with an off-spinner to balance the group, and finding a batsman who could contribute this for specific match-ups could be very useful.

Several obvious options from the overseas pool who could fit this gap would be Glenn Maxwell and Moeen Ali, and both would look decent choices.

Maxwell has struggled of late at IPL level but I’m unconvinced this isn’t just variance - a player like him needs backing. Moeen offers so much to T20 franchises as a flexible batter, spin hitter & useful bowler.

I think they’ll go down the experienced road if they pick an overseas opener, so another opener who could fit the bill here (without the bowling option) would be Alex Hales. He’s got recency bias on his side after a superb BBL but his underlying data is also excellent.

Delhi - Need a high quality pace bowler, opening batsmen, another keeper and a lower-order hitter/all-rounder. Had high bowling boundary % concession last season - mainly via pace bowling - and fell a little short in both Powerplay and death batting.

The question marks surrounding the South Africa international schedule dictate that Delhi are likely to look at overseas pace bowlers as back-up options for Rabada and Nortje in the auction. However, they have one of the lowest budgets in the auction.

This is why I’d have looked to release Hetmyer at almost 8 Crore, to free up some more budget. My view is that he has potential but could either be bought back cheaper, or an equivalent player could be purchased for less money to give greater flexibility at auction.

Given the lack of budget, a high-quality pace option such as Jhye Richardson is unlikely to be in their price range. They may have to go more ‘Moneyball’ with their three overseas picks or replacement players.

Considering this & the areas where I think they need to strengthen, they could look at Sam Billings, Rahmanullah Gurbaz or Josh Inglis as keepers with attacking intent and future upside who can contribute in either the Powerplay overs or at the death.

Other openers who could work for them as cheaper picks could be Liam Livingstone, Finn Allen or Evin Lewis - as with Jhye Richardson, Alex Hales is likely to be out of their price range.

For pace bowlers, a few lower budget options I’d consider for them would be Adam Milne, Mustafizur, or Naveen-ul-Haq. All three have strong death bowling numbers and should, in theory, improve their pace boundary concession with the ball.

Punjab - Need pace bowlers, bowlers in general, an elite leg-spinner, spin hitters with the bat, bowlers who can bat. Last year they had strong batting, weak bowling. Poor pace economy, second worst death economy in the tournament.

A player that could solve their pace bowling issues to an extent is already in their squad - Ishan Porel. I flagged him as having high potential in my book before last year’s tournament. He didn’t get game time last year but since had an excellent SMA & has nice upside.

After overpaying last year, they could look to pick Sheldon Cotterell back up as primarily a 2/3 over Powerplay option, but with their budget available they also need some 2/2 Powerplay/death bowling options and ideally some who could bat.

Jhye Richardson would be an obvious pick up here, and helps solve their issues which had the tail frequently starting at 7 last year (Jordan, Mujeeb at 7 etc). He’s a really improving death hitter as well. Chris Morris could also come into the equation here in this area.

Kyle Jamieson or perhaps Ben Cutting, Dan Christian or Lewis Gregory could also fit the bill here for Punjab Kings and I’d also look at Moeen Ali who covers the spin-hitter area, offers batting role flexibility and overs with the ball.

Other spin-hitters who could do well for them include Rahmanullah Gurbaz (who despite being an opener is strong against spin), or Josh Inglis, but with their budget I’d expect them to go for more ‘obvious’ picks.

Elite leg spinners are a pretty rare skillset so Punjab may have to either overpay or compromise on quality to some degree. Qais Ahmad, Adil Rashid or Sandeep Lamichhane could come into the conversation for them from an overseas perspective.

KKR - Need several opening batsmen, better batters in general, death bowling reinforcements. As a squad dynamic last year they had good boundary hitting but mediocre bowling. Poor batting stability & poor Powerplay batting output.

Given the opener issues, I’m surprised they released Tom Banton (and didn’t give him more opportunities) because he was cheap and offers really good future upside as a keeper/batter. I’d have kept him as opposed to Seifert as a cheap overseas batter.

On the subject of openers, I’d look to rip up the Narine script as well. Research which I’ve done previously suggests that opening Narine negatively impacts their death hitting (because of his low balls per dismissal which means lower batters have to come in earlier).

Given this, I’d look at 2 openers but with their budget it is going to be tricky to get big names. Hales is likely to be too expensive & given obvious ‘reasons’ is unlikely to be a KKR pick. In my view, Gurbaz would be a useful pick-up for them as an aggressive squad opener.

Considering their captain, they might also go with the England connection and look at Jason Roy or Liam Livingstone as potential openers. I don’t think either will be absurdly expensive at auction & base price is a real possibility.

For pace/death bowling options, they are going to have to go more ‘Moneyball’, in my view. Adam Milne, Mustafizur, Naveen-ul-Haq, Nathan Ellis or even the young South African pace bowler Gerald Coetzee could be cheap signings for them who have strong upside.

Mumbai - In my opinion, the most complete team in the tournament by some distance. Primarily I think they need to focus on a 2/2 Powerplay/death bowler and general pace bowling reinforcements given the release of their overseas players in this area.

Their strategy is interesting (and I advocate it) as the team who released the most overseas players because it goes along with what I said earlier of there being limited reasons as to why you’d retain overseas players. They have their strategy nailed.

They have around 15 Crore to play with at auction and I’d probably go up to about half of this to buy Jhye Richardson. He would be absolutely perfect for them as that 2/2 bowler who can slot into their team at 8 and offer ‘even’ more death hitting ability.

Mumbai have a team full of hitters & having this extra depth would be useful to give their main batters even more licence to attack. The signing makes complete sense to me, but by the same token, rival franchises should be doing everything they can to stop it happening...

Last year the lack of a premium quality, proven death bowler to go alongside Bumrah was arguably Mumbai’s weakness. Both Boult and Pattinson are more Powerplay operators, so in my view this one area is where they could be improved.

They are also likely to target squad pace bowlers given the release of 4 overseas pacers. Milne, Naveen, Mustafizur, Ellis or Meredith could come into the conversation. Fabian Allen might suit them as a fairly like-for-like back-up hitter replacement for Sherfane Rutherford.

Rajasthan - Need numerous death/pace bowlers. At least 1 quality overseas batter. Last year they had decent boundary-hitting (3rd best) but very poor death/general bowling economy & lacked batting stability. They have to find better pace bowlers to help the outstanding Archer.

One of their pace bowling options moving forward continues to be Kartik Tyagi, who showed raw promise last year and it could well be that the franchise is putting a lot of faith into him to develop.

They will probably go into the local pace bowling market as well. However, I was surprised by the Tye/Unadkat retentions among their pace bowling group.

With a big budget, I’d also look to fight other teams for Jhye Richardson and maybe also Chris Morris who have strong death bowling numbers & offer ability with the bat which would help to some extent negate the top order’s stability issues.

The main question for Royals with their overseas picks is where do they fit in the group. They have a settled English overseas core of Buttler/Stokes/Archer having released Steve Smith, which was a good move in my view.

Quite simply, my opinion on Smith’s release focuses simply on the lack of need for IPL franchises to spend big amounts of money at auction on stability/rotation-orientated overseas players. These players are a reasonably plentiful resource in the local market.

The problem RR have with their team is with the final overseas slot. Do they go for a gun pace bowler (they really need one) or do they go fairly like-for-like with Smith and pick a proven overseas batter?

The Stokes quandary doesn’t help either given uninspiring bowling output - should he be an auto-pick?

RCB - Need strong spin-hitters (ideally who can bowl too), ideally left-handed batters and death bowlers. RCB had poor batting output - the worst team boundary % in the competition by a long way. They lack left-handed batsmen & would benefit from more left-right combos.

They also need to focus on improving middle over batting intent (just 6.5% boundaries vs spinners as a group last year) & need better spin hitters to go alongside Philippe - an excellent player of spin. Given all this, I’m surprised they released Moeen Ali who ticks those boxes.

In my opinion, they clearly need a batter who bowls spin in the top six - Liam Livingstone and Glenn Maxwell are other options, maybe Shakib Al Hasan also although I’m unconvinced about his strike rate upside and coming off a period of inactivity is also a risk.

Although he doesn’t bowl, a useful left-handed back-up opener could be Evin Lewis.

RCB spinners last year (Chahar, Sundar, Zampa) performed really well compared to other spin bowling groups but as is often the case with them in recent years, they need more of an overhaul of the pace bowling group which had too many one-phase specialists for my liking last year.

They do have a reasonably big budget, having released numerous players, and again could target premium death bowling options such as Jhye Richardson. Did they release Chris Morris as a gamble to buy him back cheaper? I guess we shall see.

SRH - Probably the team likely to perform the least amount of activity at auction given few slots & limited budget, my perception is that as is often the case, they need death hitters and boundary-hitters in general.

They had mediocre boundary-hitting last year but very strong bowling (good economy via both pace and spin) but they had, as has been the case before, the worst death strike rate in the tournament last year.

Last season we saw the franchise seemingly prioritise dot-ball avoidance often as opposed to boundary-hitting (a poor strategy in my view given historical data suggests boundary-hitting is much more of a driver of success) and I think they need to address this.

Abdul Samad has really nice upside as a hitter and Virat Singh has really decent upside as well as a batsman in general in my opinion, so they have some potential among the younger batters. I’m surprised Virat Singh didn’t get opportunities last year.

Perhaps they could have freed up more budget by releasing the likes of Manish Pandey (11 Crore) plus Mitch Marsh (pace hitter but struggles against spin from a strike rate perspective) and arguably Shahbaz Nadeem too.

Who could they target? It’s a tough question to answer especially as their overseas slots are quite established (Warner/Bairstow/Williamson/Rashid Khan) and they only have one overseas slot remaining. Maybe a back-up pace bowler overseas following the release of Stanlake?

The other problem is that I’m unconvinced that the player they need to address their hitting issues is available via the domestic market. Perhaps their best approach would be to hope that the likes of Abdul Samad and Virat Singh kick on and establish themselves in the team.

That’s the pre-auction summary all done, if you’ve made it through this far then well done! Tomorrow I’m going to add to this thread with live tweets analysing the picks at the auction throughout the day.,,

930 am UK time on Thursday, auction about to start. Expect mediocre domestic players with IPL experience to go for big money - this isn't necessarily reflective of player quality, more due to these players being a scarce resource.

A few people have mentioned names of overseas players who could be picked up. I think it's important to remember that there are only 22 overseas slots available & teams are likely to look for 'point of difference' players & players who specifically fit the gaps in their squad...

Again, being unsold in this mini-auction is not necessarily going to be reflective of an overseas player's ability given these slot constraints.

However, you can also probably strike a line through about 75% of the overseas players in the auction list.

First lot at auction - Karun Nair. Unsold. Could potentially be brought back later in the auction.

First overseas player is Alex Hales. Unsold too. Pretty surprising that given recency bias from BBL - but could be also brought back later in the auction.

Jason Roy also unsold. Unsurprising considering Hales was unsold & Roy had a higher base price at 2 Crore.

First bid in the auction - RCB at 2 Crore for Steve Smith. Delhi win at 2.2 Crore - a big discount from his previous salary at Rajasthan Royals.

Perhaps indicative of IPL teams finally realising that overseas strike rotators/stability players have been overvalued in the past.

On a side note, it's bizarre that RCB opened the bidding for Smith - he's the opposite type of player they should be targeting given their issues with boundary intent in the middle overs.

Lewis/Finch unsold. Again could come back later on in the auction.

Franchises understandably being cautious early on given the various moving parts which take place at auction.

Big bidding war between CSK and RCB for Glenn Maxwell.

Expected him to be popular, but not 'this' popular. Sold for 14.25 Crore to RCB. He suits what they need pretty well - maybe batting 5?

Kedar Jadhav unsold at 2 Crore. I'm surprised to see this (franchises have valued reputation/old players quite a lot in the past plus Indian domestic a scarce resource) but him unsold is further evidence that franchises have started to become smarter with their recruitment.

Shakib Al Hasan sold for 3.2 Crore. Seems reasonable enough. He has a fairly rare skillset as a spin all-rounder who can bat top 6 but my concerns would focus on 1) SR upside, 2) injuries, 3) lack of game time after suspension.

Another bidding war, this time for Moeen Ali - 7 Crore to CSK. Looks like they were after a hitter after being outbid for Maxwell, which makes sense.

As said previously, I thought RCB not retaining him was absurd and this was proven given the big upgrade in his value.

Shivam Dube sold to RR for 4.4 Crore. Hmmmmm, very torn by this. The guys @TheCricketPod called his big salary but I'm uninspired given that in my view he's a player who doesn't get in a team as a batter or a bowler. Also not absurdly good SR upside.

However this does illustrate that Indian domestic players who have decent IPL experience will likely get big paydays in this auction due to them being a scarce resource.

Finishing off the lots before the 15 minute break, Chris Morris went to RR for 16.25 Crore - huge price!

Again we see the rare skillset scenario influencing the prices & he could be a real boost to RR as a death bowler and death over pace hitter.

They really needed a player like that to try and address their stability issues (this can be solved in various ways, such as picking up extra batting depth among the bowling group as seen here).

Overpriced but an understandable piece of recruitment.

With Maxwell/Moeen/Morris we've seen that the IPL franchises are willing to pay premium prices for that rare skillset of an all-rounder who can be a hitter with the bat.

There aren't many players around with this dynamic & I expected them to go big - although not this big.

Finally before the break Dawid Malan was picked up for 1.5 Crore to Punjab Kings. It wasn't a big surprise that Malan got a deal given 'world ranking' but I am not surprised that he didn't attract more bids - IPL teams will be aware of potential SR/slow start limitations.

I'd also question whether he complements the Kings batting group. I'd look to try and bring in a premium hitter against spin who can bat around the number 5 role instead.

Overseas keepers proving unpopular.

Phillips/Carey/Billings/Perera all unsold. Billings could be an option for teams to bring back later on in the auction.

Overseas pace bowlers unsurprisingly with plenty of interest. Adam Milne started off as a Moneyball pick but ended up costing a fair bit more, going for 3.2 Crore to MI. A smart pick-up for them as a strong multi-phase squad bowler. Surprised RR didn't go bigger on him.

Instead, RR picked up Mustafizur at 1 Crore base price. They were clearly (and unsurprisingly) in the pace bowler market, and probably still are...

I told a few people that I know inside cricket that I thought Jhye Richardson would be the most expensive player at auction.

I wasn't quite right, but I wasn't far off either - big bidding war across multiple teams see him go to Kings XI for 14 Crore. A great pick up for them.

Jhye should, in theory, really help them address those death hitting/depth issues which beset them last year (Jordan, Mujeeb at 7 etc). Offers big upside primarily with the ball as a potential 2/2 phase operator but also as an improving lower order hitter.

Nathan Coulter-Nile also popular as yet another pace bowler who can hit with the bat (valuable dynamic both in my view & the franchises view also).

5 Crore returning back to MI.

Spinners unpopular at auction. Mujeeb/Qais/Sodhi/Harbhajan all unsold.

I called the likely lack of interest for Harbhajan on @TheCricketPod but of course teams could come back for him later on in the bidding.

Among this, Powerplay specialist Umesh Yadav goes to DC for 1 Crore - probably less than many would have anticipated but I was surprised many people tipped him up as being a valuable pick.

Also Piyush Chawla goes to Mumbai. Back-up spinner which they probably needed?

Saying that, he's running at around 9 economy across the last 2 IPL seasons and looks a real risk at 32 years of age.

Domestic batters now. Rana unsold - hit almost 20% boundaries in SMA recently, might even be one who comes back at 20 lakh. C Hari Nishanth, another player with decent hitting numbers at lower levels, also unsold.

Sachin Baby at 20 lakh to RCB. Mediocre boundary-hitter (around 16% at lower levels), good rotator. Decent stability (high balls per dismissal). A domestic back-up for Kohli?

RCB also pick up Rajat Patidar for base price. Over 20% boundaries in the last two years in SMA. Reasonable rotation and stability numbers too.

Upside very possible despite being 27 years of age.

Himmat Singh, Vishnu Solanki, Atit Sheh all unsold. Ripal Patel to Delhi for 20 lakh - looks a real out and out hitter with around 30% boundaries last two years in SMA. Could easily provide some upside.

Shahrukh Khan was tipped by many to be a popular choice at auction and so it proved - to Kings for 5.25 Crore.

Decent hitting numbers in recent lower-level domestic comps although below-average retention data (not an major issue though if you can hit 20%+ boundaries).

* This should say rotation data not retention data. It's been a long day already!