Five of the six franchises retained their teams for Dhangadi Premier League (DPL), the city-based twenty20 cricket scheduled for March 31 to April 14.

Mahendranagar United replaced Kanchanpur Iconic, informed the organisers Dhangadi Cricket Academy (DCA) at a programme organised to reveal strategic players, teams and its owners on Wednesday. All six teams have Nepali national cricketers as their ‘strategic player’ which is similar to marquee player. The strategic and foreigner players will not go under the hammer. The base price of strategic player is Rs 200,000. Of the six teams Mahendranagar, owned by Sushil Kumar Shrestha, have Nepali international Binod Bhandari as their strategic player. 

Other franchises include Kathmandu Goldens, CYC Attariya, Team Chauraha Dhangadi, Rupandehi Challengers and Biratnagar Kings. “A team will have to mandatorily field two abroad players in a match,” said DCA president Subash Shahi. “A team can hire foreign players on their own but if required we are ready provide assistance in this regard,”  

Challengers, owned by Suraj Upreti, retained their former captain Shakti Gauchan as a strategic player. Goldens, owned by Ramesh Silwal, named national team vice-captain Gyanendra Malla as their strategic player. National team skipper Paras Khadka switched to Biratnagar Kings from the defending champions Team Chauraha. Khadka is the strategic player of Biratnagar. Kings are owned by Paras Luniya. Sompal Kami is the strategic player of Team Chauraha, owned by Raj Kumar Shrestha. Attariya, owned by Creative Youth Club (CYC), named Dipendra Singh Airee as strategic player. 

The second edition of the tournament offers a whopping Rs 2.5 million for the champions and the Rs 1 million for the runners-up, making it the highest cash-prize domestic cricket tournament. Everest Premier League, another franchised-based  twenty20 tournament had offered Rs 2.1 million to the champions last month. The third and fourth placed teams of the DPL-2 will walk away with Rs 300,000 and Rs 200,000. Man-of-the-match will get Rs 10,000 each with man-of-the-series will ride home a two-wheeler. 

Each team have been set ceiling of Rs 1.1 million for 12 players except for the strategic and foreign recruits during the auction, which is set for February 21. Players will be auctioned in four categories with national cricketers who have the experience of at least 15 international matches or have represented Nepal for three years included in ‘A’ category. The ‘A’ category players will have base price of Rs 100,000 and could be auctioned for a maximum of Rs 150,000.

Other senior and age-group national players are in ‘B’ category. They will have base price of Rs 50,000 but cannot be bought beyond Rs 100,000 in auction. Uncapped players are in ‘C’ category with base price of Rs 25,000. They can be sold up to Rs 75,000. Local players from Farwest are included in ‘D’ category with base price of Rs 20,000 and have ceiling of Rs 40,000. 

Gyanendra Malla said that tournaments like DPL would motivate new players to pursue their career in cricket. National team coach Jagat Tamatta said such tournament will be a big boost for the development of cricket in the country. Top four teams after the round robin league will qualify for the playoffs. Top two will play the first qualifier for the place in the final, while the losers will await the winners of the match between third and fourth-placed team to play in the second qualifier. The winners of the second qualifier will play against the winners of the first qualifiers in the final.