Delhi Capitals (formerly known as Delhi Daredevils) have been one of the best teams in last 3 seasons. After playing the playoffs in 2012, they had to wait for 7 years to be in playoffs again. With the change of name in 2018, they had the change in fortunes as well. They qualified for the playoffs in 2019, 2020 and 2021. They reached the final in 2020. The players and the coaching staff (Ricky Ponting, Sourav Ganguly {2019}, Mohammad Kaif, etc.) had a huge role to play in it. However, with many of its players moving to other franchises, it will be interesting to see how they fare in this as well as the next few seasons.
Delhi Capitals had an available salary cap of Rs. 47.50 crores going into the auction. The franchise had earlier retained 4 players in their squad for IPL 2022. The IPL 2020 finalists retained Rishabh Pant, Axar Patel, Prithvi Shaw and Anrich Nortje. Delhi Capitals bought 20 players during IPL 2022 auction.
Delhi Capitals (DC) Full Squad After IPL Auction 2022
Retained players:
Rishabh Pant (Rs 16 cr)
Axar Patel (Rs 9 cr)
Prithvi Shaw (Rs 7.5 cr)
Anrich Nortje (Rs 6.5 cr)
Players bought in auction:
David Warner (Rs 6.25 crore)
Mitchell Marsh (Rs 6.50 crore)
Shardul Thakur (Rs 10.75 crore)
Mustafizur Rahman (Rs 2 crore)
Kuldeep Yadav (Rs 2 crore)
Ashwin Hebbar (Rs 20 lakh)
Sarfaraz Khan (Rs 20 lakh)
Kamlesh Nagarkoti (Rs 1.1 crore)
KS Bharat (Rs 2 crore)
Mandeep Singh (Rs 1.1 crore)
Khaleel Ahmed (Rs 5.2 crore)
Chetan Sakariya (Rs 4.2 crore)
Lalit Yadav (Rs 65 lakhs)
Ripal Patel (Rs 20 lakhs)
Yash Dhull (Rs 50 lakhs)
Rovman Powell (Rs 2.8 crore)
Pravin Dubey (Rs 50 lakhs)
Lungi Ngidi (Rs 50 lakhs)
Tim Seifert (Rs 50 lakhs)
Vicky Ostwal (20 lakhs)
Best XI:
David Warner
Prithvi Shaw
KS Bharat
Rishabh Pant
Mitchell Marsh
Rovman Powell
Axar Patel
Shardul Thakur
Chetan Sakariya
Kuldeep Yadav
Anrich Nortje
Backups:
Openers: Mandeep Singh
Middle Order: Sarfaraz Khan
All Rounders: Lalit Yadav
Pacers: Khaleel Ahmed, Kamlesh Nagarkoti, Mustafizur Rahman, Lungi Ngidi
In the last few seasons, Delhi had Shikhar Dhawan and Shreyas Iyer in their top order. This year the place of Dhawan should easily be filled by David Warner but in order to fill up the boots of Shreyas Iyer, the likes of KS Bharat will need to step up. Prithvi Shaw and Rishabh Pant will look to continue what they have been doing till now for the Delhi Capitals. They will have a like for like change in Mitchell Marsh, who is likely to play the role Marcus Stoinis used to play for them. Rovman Powell will fill in the boots of Shimron Hetmyer. Axar Patel will continue to lead the spin attack. In the last few seasons, he had the support of Ravichandran Ashwin and Amit Mishra. This year Kuldeep Yadav is likely to partner him. In the last two seasons, the Proteas duo of Anrich Nortje and Kagiso Rabada created havoc but this year, there will be no Kagiso Rabada due to which the likes of Shardul Thakur, Lungi Ngidi, Mustafizur Rahman and Chetan Sakariya will need to step up.