Delhi – IPL 2025
Former England captain and cricket legend Kevin Pietersen is all set to make a comeback after a long time to the Indian Premier League (IPL), this time his comeback is as a mentor for Delhi Capitals squad of IPL 2025. This is the first time he will be coaching any IPL team in his entire career. This announcement was made by DC through their social media handle, where DC had made a post quoting, “Tell the world, KP is back home!”
Kevin Pietersen is Making a Come-Back in Delhi Capital Team as a Mentor
Pietersen will become a part of a well established coaching unit of DC that includes head coach Hemang Badani, assistant coach Matthew Mott, and Munaf Patel as the bowling coach of DC’s team. Whereas Venugopal Rao will continue as the franchise’s director of cricket. While expressing his feeling about this comeback, Pietersen has stated,
“I am looking forward to working closely with the boys of DC and to do everything I can do to help us achieve our goal of winning the title (IPL Title 2025).”
As we know, Pietersen have previously played for Delhi in the IPL and he had also captained Delhi during the IPL season of 2014. However, that season was proved to be a tough one for Pietersen and Delhi, in that IPL season of 2014 DC finished at the bottom of the table because of their poor performances in that season with just two wins out of 14 matches.
Despite stepping away as a player from the IPL tournament, he has maintained a strong relationship with the franchise of Delhi Captials over the years. His connection with Kiran Kumar Grandhi, the chairman of GMR and one of the co-owners of DC, has remained strong. Because of their strong bond, Pietersen has played a role in collaboration of Hampshire County Cricket Club with Kiran Kumar Grandhi in 2024.
Delhi has never won any IPL title till now, they have only reached once in the finals of this tournament’s history. In the last years IPL of 2024, somehow Delhi had managed to finish at the sixth-place in the end, the franchise have made some significant changes for the upcoming 2025 season of the IPL. In the mega auction of IPL in 2025, Delhi Capital had entered the auctions with the highest purse value after releasing several high-profile players and made some crucial acquisitions for the upcoming seasons of IPL. Lets have a look on complete squad of Delhi after the mega auction of IPL.
Delhi Capital Full Squad for IPL 2025
Retained Players of Delhi Capital
| No. | Player | Price | Type | Role |
| 1 | Axar Patel | ₹16.50 crore | Indian (capped) | Bowler |
| 2 | Kuldeep Yadav | ₹13.25 crore | Indian (capped) | Bowler |
| 3 | Tristan Stubbs | ₹10 crore | Overseas (capped) | Batter |
| 4 | Abishek Porel | ₹4 crore | Indian (uncapped) | Batter/WK |
RTM (Right to Match)
| No. | Player | Price | Type | Role |
| 5 | Jake Fraser-McGurk | ₹9 crore | Overseas (capped) | Batter |
| 6 | Mukesh Kumar | ₹8 crore | Indian (capped) | Bowler |
Auction Buys (Capped Players of DC)
| No. | Player | Price | Type | Role |
| 7 | KL Rahul | ₹14 crore | Indian (capped) | Batter/WK |
| 8 | T Natarajan | ₹10.75 crore | Indian (capped) | Bowler |
| 9 | Mitchell Starc | ₹11.75 crore | Overseas (capped) | Bowler |
| 10 | Harry Brook | ₹6.25 crore | Overseas (capped) | Batter |
| 11 | Faf du Plessis | ₹2 crore | Overseas (capped) | Batter |
| 12 | D Chameera | ₹75 lakh | Overseas (capped) | Bowler |
| 13 | Donovan Ferreira | ₹75 lakh | Overseas (capped) | Batter |
Auction Buys (Uncapped Players of DC)
| No. | Player | Price | Type | Role |
| 14 | Ashutosh Sharma | ₹3.80 crore | Indian (uncapped) | All-rounder |
| 15 | Mohit Sharma | ₹2.20 crore | Indian (uncapped) | Bowler |
| 16 | Sameer Rizvi | ₹95 lakh | Indian (uncapped) | All-rounder |
| 17 | Karun Nair | ₹50 lakh | Indian (uncapped) | Batter |
| 18 | Vipraj Nigam | ₹50 lakh | Indian (uncapped) | All-rounder |
| 19 | Madhav Tiwari | ₹40 lakh | Indian (uncapped) | All-rounder |
| 20 | Darshan Nalkande | ₹30 lakh | Indian (uncapped) | All-rounder |
| 21 | Ajay Mandal | ₹30 lakh | Indian (uncapped) | All-rounder |
| 22 | Manvanth Kumar | ₹30 lakh | Indian (uncapped) | All-rounder |
| 23 | Tripurana Vijay | ₹30 lakh | Indian (uncapped) | All-rounder |
With these players in Delhi’s squad for the future, DC has added experience and some match winning players by buying them in the mega auction, players like KL Rahul, T Natarajan, Mitchell Starc, Harry Brook, Faf du Plessis and few more. Adding these players into their squad, making them look like a strong contender for the title of upcoming season of IPL.
