The much-awaited MiLC draft was rolled out on Wednesday, June 7, 2023. It kicked off at 5 PM EDT starting from the East Cost. The draft was divided into 4 main divisions – Eastern, Southern, Central & Western. Eastern Division comprised New York, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania. Whereas, Los Angeles, Orange County, San Diego, Bay Area, and Sacramento were all included under Western Division. Southern Division included Atlanta and Central Division entailed only Chicago and Texas. This draft is aimed at uplifting the standards of domestic cricket in the US where ground-breaking talent could be discovered.
Below is the breakdown of the player categories and the roster structure announced by the MilC ahead of their historic draft.
Player Categories
Priority Domestic Players – Players from each team’s regional zone selected prior to the draft.
Domestic Player – Players from each team’s regional zone selected during the draft or retained from the 2022 roster.
U-21 Player – Players from each team’s regional zone born after August 31, 2003, selected before the draft.
U-19 Player – Players from each team’s regional zone born after August 31, 2001, selected before the draft.
Free Agent – Domestic players from any draft zone available for selection prior to the player draft.
Wildcard Players – Any player from anywhere approved for selection. At least one wildcard must be a domestic player.
Retained Player – Any player that is retained by the franchise from its 2022 draft, as long as that player remains located in that franchise’s respective draft zone.
Roster Structure
The roster structure to be followed by all teams are as follows:
- Each team will feature a minimum of 16 and a maximum of 18 players in their squad.
- Domestic players are to be added from local catchment areas allotted to each team.
- It is mandatory for teams to include two U-21 players & one U-19 player.
- Teams are allowed to retain a maximum of 3 players from last season.
- Professional players with international experience can be selected under Priority Domestic Player and Wildcard Player Categories.
- Teams will have two minutes to make their selections.
- The draft continues until each team meets the minimum roster composition requirements above.
Draft Results
Were among the 6 teams that were embroiled in an intense bidding war from Eastern Division. Here are the draft picks for each team below:
Empire State Titans
PICK #1: Gajanand Singh
PICK #2: Savan Patel
PICK #3: Aman Patel
PICK #4: Deepak Puttur
PICK #5: Towhidul Islam
PICK #6: Vansh Patel
PICK #7: Mario Lobban
Manhattan Yorkers
PICK #1: Hiren Patel
PICK #2: Deep Patel
PICK #3: Siddarth Kappa
PICK #4: Deep Joshi
PICK#5: Shiv Patel
The Philadelphians
PICK #1: Deveshwari Prashad
PICK #2: Raj Nannan
PICK #3: Juanoy Drysdale
PICK #4: Mario Rampersaud
PICK #5: Sivaram Swarna
New Jersey Somerset Cavaliers
PICK #1: Shawn Finlay
PICK #2: Paul Palmer
PICK #3: Steven Katwaroo
PICK #4: Waleed Karimullah
PICK #5: Ahmed Labib
New Jersey Stallions
PICK #1: Siddarth Matani
PICK #2: Derone Davis
PICK #3: Raahil Amarshi
PICK#4: Karan Patel
PICK #5: Shayaan Saad
Following the successful conclusion of the Eastern Division draft, the MiLC team headed to Texas where they conducted the Central Division draft. Here are the results after 5 rounds of selection between 4 teams from the Central Division.
Houston Hurricanes
PICK #1: Ahsan Shah
PICK #2: Huzefa Ahmed
PICK #3: Kamran Sheikh
PICK #4: Hassan Rashid
PICK #5: Arir Ali
Dallas Mustangs
PICK #1: Naseer Jamali
PICK #2: Nkrumah Bonner
PICK #3: Adnan Haroon
PICK #4: Prathmesh Power
Pick #5: Jannisar Khan
Dallas Foria Giants
PICK #1: Sanchit Bhatia
PICK #2: Ajay Masand
PICK #3: Sachin Ashokan
PICK #4: Adwait Bilgiri Jagganath
PICK #5: Abhiram Valisammagari
Lone Star Athletics
PICK #1: Gaurav Bajaj
PICK #2: Waqas Saleem
PICK #3: Hamza Khalid
PICK #4: Aarin Nadkarni
PICK #5: Arya Kannatha
The team later headed to the Western Division where they conducted the drafts in Bay Area and San Diego. Here are the results from that draft:
San Diego Surf Riders
PICK #1: Sanchit Sandhu
PICK #2: Gayan Fernando
PICK #3: Abhinay Vanipally
PICK #4: Jaideep Reddy
PICK #5: Burhanuddin Bharmal
Cricket Lashings
PICK #1: Wais Quraishi
PICK #2: Muhammad Zaid
PICK #3: Pranav Reddy Pagidyala
PICK #4: Rubal Raina
PICK #5: Deepak Gosain
Silicon Valley Strikers
PICK #1: Kulvinder Singh
PICK #2: Ruchir Joshi
PICK #3: Arsh Buch
PICK #4: Mohak Buch
PICK #5: Siddhant Senthil
PICK #6: Umang Parikh
Golden State Grizzlies
PICK #1: Karan Chandel
PICK #2: Dilpreet Billing
PICK #3: Rashid Ajami
PICK #4: Arshdeep Singh Jammu
PICK #5: John Manohar Bangaru
East Bay Blazers
PICK #1: Brody Couch
PICK #2: Abhishek Paradkar
PICK #3: Abhi Singh
PICK #4: Rudrik Suthar
PICK #5: Aakash Sundaresan
Zubin Surkari, the Tournament Director of Minor League Cricket has expressed his enthusiasm for orchestrating the professional T20 league and is heavily impressed with the developments leading into the season. “The third season of Minor League Cricket promises to bring more great action for American cricket fans this summer. We are grateful to our title partner Sunoco for their ongoing support fuelling the competition.”
The drafts in other zones are yet to be concluded. MilC has agreed that they will head to Chicago at a later date to conduct the remaining drafts. As we gradually move closer to the launch date, a lot of interesting headlines await us as many teams are yet to select their picks for the 3rd edition of the Minor Cricket League.