How the NPL Auction Works: From Retention to Lucky Draw

Before a ball is bowled in the Nepal Premier League, the season is shaped in a hall. Season 3’s auction on 6 July 2026 turned a 155-player shortlist into eight squads, with 52 players retained before bidding began, 37 sold in the live session, and the rest filled from franchise wishlists. Each team worked with a purse of NPR 90 lakh, and the biggest story of the day needed no bidding war at all — a lucky draw, after seven franchises matched the top bid for Aasif Sheikh. Retention, shortlist, live bidding, tie-breaks and wishlist: that is the whole machine.

Retention first, then the shortlist

Auction day starts long before the first bid. Franchises retain a core of players from the previous season (52 were kept before the Season 3 auction), and the rest go back into the pool. From that pool, a shortlist of 155 players is drawn up for the live session, covering Nepali domestic players and overseas names. Retention also explains why so many Season 3 squads look familiar: 52 players never entered the auction room at all, having been kept by their franchises before bidding began.

Retention is where squad identity is built. Karnali kept captain Sompal Kami as their marquee and face of the franchise for a third consecutive season, and Biratnagar kept wicketkeeper-batter Lokesh Bam as part of a six-player core. The boldest retention call of Season 3 was a release, not a retention: Janakpur let go of their marquee Aasif Sheikh, the first franchise in league history to release its marquee player — a decision that set up the auction’s biggest moment.

Live bidding, and the lucky draw

On auction day, each franchise bids from its purse of NPR 90 lakh, and the live session sold 37 players before wishlists completed the squads. When two or more franchises land on the same top bid for a player, the auction does not go to another round of bidding — it goes to a lucky draw.

Aasif Sheikh’s move proved the rule. Seven of the eight franchises bid for him, with only Chitwan staying silent, and the matched top bid was settled by a draw that sent him to Lumbini Lions for NPR 20 lakh — the most expensive buy of the auction and a record price for a Nepali player in the league. The 15-lakh club behind him shows how the money spread: Arjun Gharti to Pokhara, Bibek Kumar Yadav to Chitwan, Rupesh Kumar Singh to Biratnagar and Trit Raj Das to Janakpur, each at NPR 15 lakh.

Team spends and the wishlist finish

Team spending at the auction tells its own story about strategy. Lumbini spent the most at NPR 44 lakh, followed by Janakpur at 41.25 lakh and Biratnagar at 37.25 lakh. Pokhara spent 26.75 lakh, while Sudurpaschim, Chitwan and Karnali each spent 26 lakh, and Kathmandu spent the least at 17 lakh — trusting a retained core over auction-day shopping.

Pool tiers are set by base price: Category A holds 5 players at a base of NPR 10 to 15 lakh, Category B holds 27 players at a base of NPR 5 lakh, and Category C holds 123 players at a base of NPR 2 lakh. Overseas players are signed through separate international windows rather than this auction, and are capped at eight registered per squad and four in a playing XI. Players not sold in the live session are not lost: franchises complete their squads from wishlists, which is how late names and backup options still find teams. The Season 3 auction also showed how fast values move for young players — Bipin Sharma, Karnali’s Local Icon at NPR 1 lakh in Season 1, was released and then rebought for NPR 5 lakh, five times his first-season price, after taking 13 wickets in the first season.