They also released big hitter Andre Russell with the West Indies player returning to the franchise as a power coach after retiring from the IPL after getting released. With such a big purse available, Kolkata are likely to strengthen their squad exponentially. The name on top of their wish list will undoubtedly be Aussie allrounder Cameron Green who is expected to go for big bucks in this auction.

The will also need a specialized wicketkeeper and might look to bring back Quinton de Kock or Rahmanullah Gurbaz. If not, they’ll still have Jonny Bairstow, Finn Allen and Ben Duckett available ion the pool. They will also likely to go for Matheesha Pathirana who was released by the Chennai Super Kings in a bit of a surprise on retention day.

Here are the players Kolkata Knight Riders have snapped up in the auction: Cameron Green (Rs 25.20 crore), Finn Allen (Rs 2 crore), Matheesha Pathirana (Rs 18 crore), Tejasvi Singh (Rs 3 crore), Kartik Tyagi (Rs 30 lakhs), Prashant Solanki (Rs 30 lakh)

List of players retained by Kolkata Knight Riders before IPL 2026 Auction: Rinku Singh, Angkrish Raghuvanshi, Ajinkya Rahane, Manish Pandey, Rovman Powell, Sunil Narine, Ramandeep Singh, Anukul Roy, Varun Chakravarthy, Harshit Rana, Vaibhav Arora, Umran Malik

Kolkata Knight Riders Full IPL 2026 squad: Rinku Singh, Angkrish Raghuvanshi, Ajinkya Rahane, Manish Pandey, Rovman Powell, Sunil Narine, Ramandeep Singh, Anukul Roy, Varun Chakravarthy, Harshit Rana, Vaibhav Arora, Umran Malik, Cameron Green, Finn Allen, Matheesha Pathirana, Tejasvi Singh, Kartik Tyagi, Prashant Solanki