The players who were with Deccan Chargers would have heaved a huge sigh of relief on Thursday after Sun TV won the Hyderabad franchise of the Indian Premier League with a bid of Rs 85.05 crores per year (around $15.9m) for a five-year deal.
It means they are officially now with the new franchise as the IPL governing council has given the new owners until the month end to sign those DC players they would like to retain. Players who don't sign a deal will become free agents and be part of the next auction.
The challenge before Sun TV now is a lack of time. They have just a week to establish their cricket set-up, most importantly put in place a team management that can take a call on the formation of their line-up.
"All the players of Deccan Chargers are available to the new franchise. The new franchise will have time till October 31 to decide who they want to retain but all the DC players are now with the Sun Group," BCCI president N Srinivasan said.
{{/usCountry}}"All the players of Deccan Chargers are available to the new franchise. The new franchise will have time till October 31 to decide who they want to retain but all the DC players are now with the Sun Group," BCCI president N Srinivasan said.
{{/usCountry}}The board chose to look at the positives, and compared the winning bid against that of Deccan Chronicle Holdings Limited, who had in 2008 agreed to pay $ 107 million (Rs 428cr) for 10 years. That way, the current bid is almost double. However, it is half the amount of Sahara's bid ($ 370m or R1900cr for 10 years) for Pune Warriors