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Some of the world’s best cricketers have been snapped up in the 2021 Indian Premier League (IPL) player auction for this year’s tournament.

All eight franchises made new signings to give their teams a fresh look ahead of the 14th edition of the 20-over cricket competition, to be held in India.

The auction saw all-rounders in demand with South African Chris Morris becoming the most expensive cricketer in the IPL Auction history.

Jonny Bairstow has been retained by Sunrisers Hyderabad for IPL 2021. Pic: Getty.

Defending champions Mumbai Indians signed Arjun Tendulkar, son of Indian legend Sachin, for £20k in another notable pick, ahead of the 2021 IPL.

When did the IPL 2021 schedule start?

Ever since its first tournament, in 2008, the IPL has tended to take place from April.

The first match of the 2021 tournament saw Mumbai Indians face Royal Challengers Bangalore in Chennai.

The 2021 schedule sees a match played almost every day through April and May, concluding with the final on 30 May.

Eight teams will play each other twice before three qualifying matches, which sees first play second and the loser from that match play the winner of the third and fourth placed teams for a place in the final, where the IPL champions will be crowned.

Chennai Super Kings, Delhi Capitals, Kolkata Knight Riders, Mumbai Indians, Punjab Kings, Rajasthan Royals, Royal Challengers Bangalore and Sunrisers Hyderabad are all involved.

Where is the 2021 IPL tournament taking place?

The Covid pandemic has had an impact on many aspects of life, including sport, and cricket is not immune to its effects.

In 2020, the IPL was moved from India to the United Arab Emirates so that the tournament could still go ahead while adopting virus measures.

But now, the Covid situation in India is changing - which has seen fans return to grounds, the IPL tournament will return to its home country.

How can I watch the IPL on TV?

The IPL 2021 cricket tournament is being televised on Sky Sports Cricket.

Sky customers can watch the action unfold live on the satellite television provider’s dedicated cricket channel, as part of the full sports package.

Sky Sports packages range from £18 per month for the dedicated Premier League and Football channels to £25 for the complete sports package.

Alternatively, viewers can purchase a day or month passes from NOW TV from £9.99.

Who is the most expensive IPL signing?

Morris was sold to Rajasthan Royals for a record-breaking £1.6m in an auction which also saw England’s Moeen Ali sold to Chennai Super Kings for £700,000.

Royal Challengers Bangalore spent £1.5m on Kylie Jamieson and a further £1.4m on Glenn Maxwell, and the Punjab Kings spent £1.4m to secure the services of Jhye Richardson.

Krishnappa Gowtham was sold to Chennai Super Kings for £925k, Riley Meredith sold to Punjab Kings for £800k and the same franchise spent £525k on Shahrukh Khan.

Will any of England’s cricketers play in IPL 2021?

Ali will be one of 12 English players in the IPL after eight fellow internationals were retained by their respective franchises for the upcoming campaign.

Eoin Morgan, who captains England’s white ball teams, will feature for Kolkata Knight Riders and will face some of his international team-mates in the tournament.

Ben Stokes, Jofra Archer and Jos Buttler are part of the Rajasthan squad; Jonny Bairstow remains with the Sunrisers Hyderabad; Chris Woakes stays with Delhi Capitals; Chris Jordan with the Punjab Kings and Sam Curran will team up with Ali in Chennai.

Dawid Malan, who currently tops the ICC T20 batting rankings, will get his first experience of the IPL when he was picked up by Punjab Kings for £150k; Tom Curran (£500k) and Sam Billings (£200k) will join Woakes in Delhi.

Full squad list after IPL auction

Chennai Super Kings

Suresh Raina, MS Dhoni, Narayan Jagadeesabn, Ruturaj Gaikwad, KM Asif, Josh Hazlewood, Karn Sharma, Ambati Rayudu, Deepak Chahar, Faf du Plessis, Shardul Thakur, Mitchell Santner, Dwayne Bravo, Lungi Ngidi, Sam Curran, Ravindra Jadeja, Imran Tahir, Robin Uthappa, Moeen Ali, K Gowtham, Cheteshwar Pujara, M.Harisankar Reddy, K.Bhagath Varma, C Hari Nishaanth

Delhi Capitals

Shreyas Iyer, Ajinkya Rahane, Amit Mishra, Avesh Khan, Axar Patel, Ishant Sharma, Kagiso Rabada, Prithvi Shaw, R Ashwin, Rishabh Pant, Shikhar Dhawan, Lalit Yadav, Marcus Stoinis, Shimron Hetmyer, Anrich Nortje, Chris Woakes, Steve Smith, Umesh Yadav, Ripal Patel, Lukman Hussain Meriwala, M Siddharth, Tom Curran, Sam Billings

Kolkata Knight Riders

Dinesh Karthik, Andre Russell, Kamlesh Nagarkoti, Kuldeep Yadav, Lockie Ferguson, Nitish Rana, Prasidh Krishna, Rinku Singh, Sandeep Warrier, Shivam Mavi, Shubman Gill, Sunil Narine, Eoin Morgan, Pat Cummins, Rahul Tripathi, Varun Chakravarthy, Ali Khan, Tim Seifert, Shakib al Hasan, Sheldon Jackson, Vaibhav Arora, Karun Nair, Harbhajan Singh, Ben Cutting, Venkatesh Iyer

Mumbai Indians

Rohit Sharma, Aditya Tare, Anmolpreet Singh, Anukul Roy, Dhawal Kulkarni, Hardik Pandya, Ishan Kishan, Jasprit Bumrah, Jayant Yadav, Kieron Pollard, Krunal Pandya, Quinton de Kock, Rahul Chahar, Suryakumar Yadav, Chris Lynn, Mohsin Khan, Saurabh Tiwary, Trent Boult, Adam Milne, Nathan Coulter-Nile, Piyush Chawla, James Neeshan, Yudhvir Charak, Marco Jansen, Arjun Tendulkar

Punjab Kings

KL Rahul (c), Chris Gayle, Mayank Agarwal, Nicholas Pooran, Mandeep Singh, Sarfaraz Khan, Deepak Hooda, Prabhsimran Singh, Mohammed Shami, Chris Jordan, Darshan Nalkande, Ravi Bishnoi, Murugan Ashwin, Arshdeep Singh, Harpreet Brar, Ishan Porel, Dawid Malan, Jhye Richardson, Shahrukh Khan, Riley Meredith, Moises Henriques, Jalaj Saxena, Utkarsh Singh, Fabian Allen, Sumit Kumar

Rajasthan Royals

Sanju Samson, Ben Stokes, Jofra Archer, Jos Buttler, Riyan Parag, Shreyas Gopal, Rahul Tewatia, Mahipal Lomror, Kartik Tyagi, Andrew Tye, Jaydev Unadkat, Mayank Markande, Yashasvi Jaiswal, Anuj Rawat, David Miller, Manan Vohra, Shivam Dube, Chris Morris, Mustafizur Rahim, Chetan Sakariya, K.C. Cariappa, Liam Livingstone, Kuldip Yadav, Akash Singh

Royal Challengers Bangalore

Virat Kohli, AB de Villiers, Yuzvendra Chahal, Devdutt Padikkal, Harshal Patel, Daniels Sams, Washington Sundar, Mohammed Siraj, Navdeep Saini, Adam Zampa, Shahbaz Ahmed, Josh Philippe, Kane Richardson, Pavan Deshpande, Glenn Maxwell, Sachin Baby, Rajat Patidar, Mohammed Azharuddeen, Kyle Jamieson, Dan Christian, Suyesh Prabhudessai, K.S. Bharat

Sunrisers Hyderabad

Kane Williamson, David Warner, Manish Pandey, Virat Singh, Priyam Garg, Abdul Samad, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Khaleel Ahmed, Sandeep Sharma, Siddharth Kaul, T Natarajan, Abhishek Sharma, Shahbaz Nadeem, Mitchell Marsh, Vijay Shankar, Mohammad Nabi, Rashid Khan, Jonny Bairstow, Wriddhiman Saha, Shreevats Goswami, Basil Thampi, Jason Holder, Jagadeesha Suchith, Kedar Yadav, Mujeeb ur Rahman

IPL 2021 full schedule

APRIL

9 – Mumbai Indians v Royal Challengers Bangalore, Chennai

10 – Chennai Super Kings v Delhi Capitals, Mumbai

11 – Sunrisers Hyderabad v Kolkata Knight Riders, Chennai

12 – Rajasthan Royals v Punjab Kings, Mumbai

13 – Kolkata Knight Riders v Mumbai Indians, Chennai

14 – Sunrisers Hyderabad v Royal Challengers Bangalore, Chennai

15 – Rajasthan Royals v Delhi Capitals, Mumbai

16 – Punjab Kings v Chennai Super Kings, Mumbai

17 – Mumbai Indians v Sunrisers Hyderabad, Chennai

18 – Royal Challengers Bangalore v Kolkata Knight Riders, Chennai

18 – Delhi Capitals v Punjab Kings, Mumbai

19 – Chennai Super Kings v Rajasthan Royals, Mumbai

20 – Delhi Capitals v Mumbai Indians, Chennai

21 – Punjab Kings v Sunrisers Hyderabad, Chennai

21 – Kolkata Knight Riders v Chennai Super King, Mumbai

22 – Royal Challengers Bangalore v Rajasthan Royals, Mumbai

23 – Punjab Kings v Mumbai Indians, Chennai

24 – Rajasthan Royals v Kolkata Knight Riders, Mumbai

25 – Chennai Super Kings v Royal Challengers Bangalore, Mumbai

25 – Sunrisers Hyderabad v Delhi Capitals, Chennai

26 – Punjab Kings v Kolkata Knight Riders, Ahmedabad

27 – Delhi Capitals v Royal Challengers Bangalore, Ahmedabad

28 – Chennai Super Kings v Sunrisers Hyderabad, Delhi

29 – Mumbai Indians v Rajasthan Royals, Delhi

29 – Delhi Capitals v Kolkata Knight Riders, Ahmedabad

30 – Punjab Kings v Royal Challengers Bangalore, Ahmedabad

MAY

1 – Mumbai Indians v Chennai Super Kings, Delhi

2 – Rajasthan Royals v Sunrisers Hyderabad, Delhi

2 – Punjab Kings v Delhi Capitals, Ahmedabad

3 – Kolkata Knight Riders v Royal Challengers Bangalore, Ahmedabad

4 – Sunrisers Hyderabad v Mumbai Indians, Delhi

5 – Rajasthan Royals v Chennai Super Kings, Delhi

6 – Royal Challengers Bangalore v Punjab Kings, Ahmedabad

7 – Sunrisers Hyderabad v Chennai Super Kings, Delhi

8 – Kolkata Knight Riders v Delhi Capitals, Ahmedabad

8 – Rajasthan Royals v Mumbai Indians, Delhi

9 – Chennai Super Kings v Punjab Kings, Bengaluru

9 – Royal Challengers Bangalore v Sunrisers Hyderabad, Kolkata

10 – Mumbai Indians v Kolkata Knight Riders, Bengaluru

11 – Delhi Capitals v Rajasthan Royals, Kolkata

12 – Chennai Super Kings v Kolkata Knight Riders, Bengaluru

13 – Mumbai Indians v Punjab Kings, Bengaluru

13 – Sunrisers Hyderabad v Rajasthan Royals, Kolkata

14 – Royal Challengers Bangalore v Delhi Capitals, Kolkata

15 – Kolkata Knight Riders v Punjab Kings, Bengaluru

16 – Rajasthan Royals v Royal Challengers Bangalore, Kolkata

16 – Chennai Super Kings v Mumbai Indians, Bengaluru

17 – Delhi Capitals v Sunrisers Hyderabad, Kolkata

18 – Kolkata Knight Riders v Rajasthan Royals, Bengaluru

19 – Sunrisers Hyderabad v Punjab Kings, Bengaluru

20 – Royal Challengers Bangalore v Mumbai Indians, Kolkata

21 – Kolkata Knight Riders v Sunrisers Hyderabad, Bengaluru

21 – Delhi Capitals v Chennai Super Kings, Kolkata

22 – Punjab Kings v Rajasthan Royals, Bengaluru

23 – Mumbai Indians v Delhi Capitals, Kolkata

23 – Royal Challengers Bangalore v Chennai Super Kings, Kolkata

25 – QUALIFIER 1, Ahmedabad

26 – ELIMINATOR, Ahmedabad

28 – QUALIFIER 2, Ahmedabad

30 – FINAL, Ahmedabad

IPL 2021: full match schedule of cricket tournament, squad lists of each team - and how to watch the action on TV