Punjab Kings are still in search of their first IPL title. In the last edition, under the captaincy of Shreyas Iyer, the team came very close to the trophy, but was defeated by Royal Challengers Bangalore in the final. Of course Punjab lost the final, but their team looked very balanced. This is the reason why this time they have released only 4 players, whereas they have expressed confidence in 21 players.

Punjab Kings can buy maximum 4 players in IPL 2026 auction. Let us tell you that all the teams playing IPL can have a maximum of 25 players. 2 out of 4 slots in Punjab are available for foreign players. Punjab Kings will have Rs 11.5 crore in the auction.

Punjab Kings will keep an eye on these players

Punjab Kings have released wicket-keeper batsman Josh English, so they will also be looking for a better wicket-keeper. It can buy big players like Devon Conway of New Zealand and Quinton de Kock of South Africa. Apart from this, they have also released Glenn Maxwell, so they can also bid on Andre Russell. Although Russell is in the news a lot, it is expected that many teams will bet on him, in such a situation it may be difficult for Punjab because he has only Rs 11.5 crore in his purse.

Punjab Kings can buy 2 all-rounders, 1 wicket keeper and a fast bowler in the auction. Out of these, it would like to buy a foreign wicket keeper, of which there are two big options, De Kock and Conway.

• Allrounder- Dasun Shanaka, Vijay Shankar, Wiaan Mulder, Liam Livingstone, Andre Russell.
• fast bowler- Akash Deep, Mathisha Pathirana.
• wicket keeper- Devon Conway, Quinton de Kock.

Punjab Kings Team (Retained Players)

Shreyas Iyer, Arshdeep Singh, Azmatullah Omarzai, Harnoor Pannu, Harpreet Brar, Lockie Ferguson, Marco Janson, Marcus Stoinis, Mitchell Owen, Musheer Khan, Nehal Wadhera, Prabhsimran Singh, Priyansh Arya, Payla Avinash, Shashank Singh, Suryansh Shedge, Vishnu Vinod, Vyshak Vijaykumar, Xavier Bartlett, Yash Thakur, Yuzvendra Chahal.

Punjab Kings released these 4

Glenn Maxwell, Josh Inglis, Aaron Hardy, Kuldeep Sen.

When is IPL 2026 auction?

The auction for Indian Premier League season 19 is on 16 December in Abu Dhabi. A total of 77 slots are vacant for all 10 teams, out of which 31 are slots for foreign players.

Before the IPL 2026 auction, all 10 teams have released their lists of retained and released players. After the announcement of IPL retention, the main squads of most of the teams have been confirmed. Now the auction to fill the remaining slots will be held on December 16. Kolkata Knight Riders is the team which has retained the least number of players. Except KKR, all the teams have retained 15 or more players. 3 teams including Punjab Kings retained 20 or more players. See here the squads of all 10 teams after the announcement of retention.

Chennai Super Kings Team (CSK Squad 2026)

Rituraj Gaikwad, MS Dhoni, Dewald Brewis, Ayush Mhatre, Urvil Patel, Anshul Kamboj, Jamie Overton, Ramakrishna Ghosh, Shivam Dubey, Khalil Ahmed, Noor Ahmed, Mukesh Chaudhary, Nathan Ellis, Shreyas Gopal, Gurjapaneet Singh, Sanju Samson.

• How many players did CSK retain – 16 (4 foreigners)
• Available Slots- 9 (4 Foreign)

Delhi Capitals Team (DC Squad 2026)

KL Rahul, Karun Nair, Abhishek Porel, Tristan Stubbs, Axar Patel, Sameer Rizvi, Ashutosh Sharma, Vipraraj Nigam, Ajay Mandal, Tripuran Vijay, Madhav Tiwari, Mitchell Starc, T Natarajan, Mukesh Kumar, Dushmantha Chameera, Kuldeep Yadav, Nitish Rana.

• How many players did DC retain – 17 (3 foreigners)
• Available Slots- 8 (5 Foreign)

Gujarat Titans Team (GT Squad 2026)

Shubman Gill, Sai Sudarshan, Kumar Kushagra, Anuj Rawat, Jos Buttler, Nishant Sindhu, Glenn Phillips, Washington Sundar, Arshad Khan, Shahrukh Khan, Rahul Tewatia, Kagiso Rabada, Mohammed Siraj, Prasidh Krishna, Ishant Sharma, Gurnoor Singh Brar, Rashid Khan, Manav Suthar, Sai Kishore, Jayant Yadav.

• How many players did GT retain – 20 (4 foreigners)
• Available Slots- 5 (4 Foreign)

Kolkata Knight Riders Team (KKR Squad)

Ajinkya Rahane, Rinku Singh, Angkrish Raghuvanshi, Manish Pandey, Rovman Powell, Anukul Roy, Ramandeep Singh, Vaibhav Arora, Sunil Narine, Varun Chakraborty, Harshit Rana, Umran Malik.

• How many players did KKR retain – 12 (2 foreigners)
• Available Slots- 13 (6 Foreign)

Lucknow Super Giants Team (LSG Squad 2025)

Rishabh Pant, Ayush Badoni, Abdul Samad, Aiden Markram, Himmat Singh, Matthew Bretzke, Nicholas Pooran, Mitchell Marsh, Shahbaz Ahmed, Arshin Kulkarni, Mayank Yadav, Avesh Khan, Mohsin Khan, M. Siddharth, Digvesh Rathi, Prince Yadav, Akash Singh, Arjun Tendulkar, Mohammed Shami.

• How many players did LSG retain – 19 (4 foreigners)
• Available Slots- 6 (4 Foreign)

Mumbai Indians Team (MI Squad 2026)

Rohit Sharma, Surya Kumar Yadav, Robin Minz, Ryan Rickelton, Tilak Verma, Hardik Pandya, Naman Dheer, Mitchell Santner, Will Jack, Corbin Bosch, Raj Bawa, Trent Boult, Jasprit Bumrah, Deepak Chahar, Ashwani Kumar, Raghu Sharma, Allah Ghazanfar, Mayank Markande, Shardul Thakur, Sherfane Rutherford.

• How many players did MI retain – 20 (7 foreigners)
• Available Slots- 5 (1 Foreign)

Punjab Kings Team (PBKS Squad 2026)

Shreyas Iyer, Nehal Wadhera, Vishnu Vinod, Harnoor Pannu, Paila Avinash, Prabhsimran Singh, Shashank Singh, Marcus Stoinis, Harpreet Brar, Marco Johnson, Azmatullah Omarzai, Priyansh Arya, Mushir Khan, Suryansh Shedge, Mitch Owen, Arshdeep Singh, Yuzvendra Chahal, Visak Vijaykumar, Yash Thakur, Xavier Bartlett, Lockie Ferguson.

• How many players did PBKS retain – 21 (6 foreigners)
• Available Slots- 4 (2 Foreign)

Royal Challengers Bangalore Team (RCB Squad 2026)

Rajat Patidar, Virat Kohli, Tim David, Devdutt Padikkal, Phil Salt, Jitesh Sharma, Krunal Pandya, Jacob Bethel, Romario Shepherd, Swapnil Singh, Josh Hazlewood, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Rasikh Salaam, Yash Dayal, Suyyash Sharma, Nuwan Thushara, Abhinandan Singh.

• How many players did RCB retain – 17 (6 foreigners)
• Available Slots- 8 (2 Foreign)

Rajasthan Royals Team (RR Squad 2026)

Shubham Dubey, Vaibhav Suryavanshi, Luan-Dre Pretorius, Shimron Hetmyer, Yashasvi Jaiswal, Dhruv Jurel, Ryan Parag, Yudhvir Singh Charak, Joffra Archer, Tushar Deshpande, Fazalhaq Farooqui, Quena Mafaka, Nandre Berger, Ravindra Jadeja, Sam Curran, Donovan Ferreira.

• How many players did RR retain – 16 (7 foreigners)
• Available Slots- 9 (1 Foreign)

Sunrisers Hyderabad Team (SRH Squad 2026)

Travis Head, Abhishek Sharma, Aniket Verma, R Smrana, Ishan Kishan, Heinrich Klaasen, Nitish Kumar Reddy, Harsh Dubey, Kamindu Mendis, Harshal Patel, Brydon Carse, Pat Cummins, Jaydev Unadkat, Ishan Malinga, Zeeshan Ansari.

• How many players did SRH retain – 15 (6 foreigners)
• Available Slots- 10 (2 Foreign)