Punjab Kings surprised many after they released star wicketkeeper Josh Inglis on the retention deadline on November 15. The PBKS retained the majority of their core as the 2025 runners-up retained 21 players.
Apart from Inglis, the Kings let go of star all-rounder Glenn Maxwell, Aaron Hardie, Kuldeep Sen and Praveen Dubey ahead of the next month's auction.
Meanwhile, the Inglis release was the major surprise, with hardly anyone expecting it. The franchise retained its core, something they are used to, but has now been under the partnership of Shreyas Iyer and Ricky Ponting.
Meanwhile, the head coach Ponting revealed the reason behind letting go of Maxwell and Inglis while speaking to the broadcaster on the retention day.
"Love Glenn and what he brings to the game. Unfortunately, last year we weren’t able to get the best out of him," Ponting told Star Sports.
"Looking ahead to this season, we didn’t feel he would be part of our starting team, so we decided to release him," Ponting added.
Why was Inglis released?
Meanwhile, Inglis' release caught many by surprise, as unlike Maxwell, he had a good IPL last season and was a star in the Qualifier 2 against the Mumbai Indians, when he took down the talisman Jasprit Bumrah.
Ponting revealed that the Aussie batter won't be available for the entirety of the season. "Josh is a terrific player. I would have loved to have had him as part of our squad going forward. But this year, he wasn't going to be available for the majority of the tournament. So for that reason, I found it pretty much impossible to be able to be able to retain him," the head coach said.
List of players released by PBKS
Josh Inglis, Glenn Maxwell, Aaron Hardie, Kuldeep Sen and Praveen Dubey
List of players retained by PBKS
Prabhsimran Singh, Priyansh Arya, Shreyas Iyer, Shashank Singh, Nehal Wadhera, Marcus Stoinis, Azmatullah Omarzai, Marco Jansen, Harpreet Brar, Yuzvendra Chahal, Arshdeep Singh, Musheer Khan, Pyala Avinash, Harnoor Pannu, Suryansh Shedge, Mitchell Owen, Xavier Bartlett, Lockie Ferguson, Vyshak Vijaykumar, Yash Thakur, Vishnu Vinod.
