Former Indian cricket team batter Aakash Chopra believes that Kolkata Knight Riders’ first retention ahead of the IPL 2025 auction should be their skipper Shreyas Iyer. Under Shreyas’ leadership, KKR went on to clinch the IPL 2025 title with a dominant victory over Sunrisers Hyderabad in the summit clash. Chopra said that he is KKR’s winning captain and with Gautam Gambhir not longer being the team’s mentor, retaining Shreyas will make sure that there is some continuity in the team. He further said that he believes that KKR owner and Bollywood superstar Shah Rukh Khan will allow Shreyas to leave the team.

“You want to firstly retain the captain, who is Shreyas Iyer. If 18 crores go, let them go because you won’t get a captain. He is your winning captain. If Gautam (Gambhir) isn’t there, retain your captain to maintain some continuity. There is no doubt that you should retain Shreyas Iyer,” he said on YouTube.

“You might get Shreyas Iyer for 18 crores using the RTM but never do that with the captain because eventually this game is played by humans, and humans have hearts, and thereby emotions. Who will understand emotions better than Khan sahab (Shahrukh Khan)? So I feel he won’t allow Shreyas Iyer to go,” the former India opener added.

Chopra also said that Rinku Singh, Sunil Narine and Andre Russell should be KKR’s other three capped retentions.

“Second – since I am looking from the Indian perspective, if Rinku Singh comes to the market, he will be sold for 14 crores. So retain Rinku Singh for sure. Retain both Andre Russell and Sunil Narine. The problem is that if you retain both, one will be for 11 crores but the fourth retention will be for 18 crores. I would say it is still worth it,” he said.