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Mohammed Siraj was not retained by RCB, and the Bengaluru-based franchise didn’t use the RTM option as well for the 31-year-old Indian pacer during the IPL 2025 mega auction, which was held in Jeddah on November 24 and 25.
RCB didn’t use RTM for Mohammed Siraj at IPL 2025 mega auction. (Picture Credit: PTI)
Indian fast bowler Mohammed Siraj was part of Royal Challengers Bengaluru in the IPL from 2018 to 2024, and during his seven-year association with the Bengaluru-based franchise, he picked up 83 wickets in 87 matches. The 31-year-old cricketer from Hyderabad, who played a big role in India’s T20 World Cup 2024 title win, wasn’t retained by the three-time IPL losing finalists ahead of the IPL 2025 mega auction. It was expected that RCB would use one of the three RTM options for Siraj. But in the two-day mega event, which took place in Jeddah on November 24 and 25, RCB didn’t exercise RTM for Siraj, and he joined Gujarat Titans for Rs 12.25 crore.
RCB’s decision to let go of Siraj came as a shock for many fans. But during a recent interview with ESPNCricinfo, RCB’s Director of Cricket, Mo Bobat, has explained the reason for missing out on Siraj. According to him, RCB prioritised signing Bhuvneshwar Kumar in the mega auction, which is why the team management had to make the tough decision of parting ways with Siraj.
“It is important to recognise what Siraj has done for RCB over a number of years. He’s been a champion player for us. Not retaining him was one of our tougher decisions, if not the toughest. We had Bhuvi (Bhuvneshwar Kumar) quite high on our list, and we wanted to give ourselves a chance to get him. Unfortunately, the way auctions work out, with Bhuvi coming quite late, it’s like a game of poker, to hold your nerve and see whether you can hold on and wait for a player, and sometimes you do and sometimes you don’t. Unfortunately, it didn’t work out for us to get Siraj just because of our priorities, auction order, and the spending pattern. That’s again quite similar for a couple of other players; both Faf (du Plessis) and Will Jacks were definitely guys we were considering right-to-matching (RTM) if things fell a certain way,” Bobat was quoted as saying.
“I’m incredibly fond of Will, and he was brilliant last year when he came into the team. He was definitely someone we were thinking of right-to-matching, but if you wait as deep as he was coming up in the auction, having not filled a role, that is a risk, and given the way the spending pattern works out and given that we missed one or two of our targets and we had probably a bit more money than we anticipated, you have to make decisions. So regrettably, Faf, Jacks, and Siraj were guys we had in our minds for right-to-matches, but it just didn’t fall that way, and you end up building your team slightly differently, which is a shame,” he added.
Jacks, who scored a century in the IPL 2024 match for RCB against Gujarat Titans in Ahmedabad, was signed for Rs 5.25 crore by Mumbai Indians in the mega auction, whereas Du Plessis joined Delhi Capitals for Rs 2 crore.
