And that would be that! MI Cape Town's #BatchOfSeason4 is here, ready to defend our title and paint the Rainbow Nation in our Blue and Gold! We had retained our core from last year, brought back a number of familiar faces and have spruced it up with some new ones. Oh, could we be more excited?! Bring on December already, please! 

Karim Janat, the wily Afghan all-rounder with the experience of playing around the world, is now set to conquer Cape Town. He comes at his base price of 1million Rand. Jacques Snyman, the Pretoria all-rounder will have his first taste of the SA20 and the #OneFamily, getting snapped up in the second express round for 200K Rand. 

7:45pm local time: The mystery man with some magic in his celebrations. The Artist. The Entertainer. The Bamboozler. Tabraiz Shamsi, the crafty left-arm wrist-spinner is how set to give it a rip at Newlands and fox batters left, right and center. 500K Rand. 

7:15pm local time: Tiaan van Vuuren causes the first bidding war in the Express set, so much so that his price jumps from 200,000 Rand to a whopping 1 million Rand. This 24-year-old all-rounder is all set to laugh his way to the bank with an MI Cape Town Blue and Gold around his chest. Yep, we've snapped him after a tough fight with JSK. And the immediate next pick, Dan Lategan - the Western Cape born, Worcestershire bred lad - is also ours, at 400K Rand, a war we win against the Paarl Royals. 

Here's a recap of how our #BatchOfSeason4 looks like: 

Retained: Trent Boult, Rashid Khan, Ryan Rickleton, George Linde, Corbin Bosch
Wild Card: Kagiso Rabada
Pre-signing: Nicholas Pooran
At the auction: Rassie van der Dussen (R5.2 million), Reeza Hendricks (R500,000), Dwaine Pretorius (R650,000), Tristan Luus (R650,000), Jason Smith (R500,000), Tom Moores (R200,000), Dane Piedt (R200,000)

6:30pm local time: It's Accelerated Auction time! Brace up for some quick picks and last minute shopping. We still have slots for five players (one of whom needs to be an under-23 player) with 3.6M Rand left in the bank. All franchises have been asked to give a list of up to ten players who they'd like to see re-appear in the Auction. 

6:25pm local time: Well, well, well. From Rassie to Reeza to Tristan to Dane Piedt. The veteran, the man with the golden arm, with the Midas touch, will stay put for 200,000 Rand. We aren't letting him go anywhere! The #OneFamily is growing!

Things are moving rather quickly here. The Moores are a popular cricketing family in England, and we have one of them joining the MICT ranks. Tom Moores, a ‘keeper-batter from Nottingham and also son of former England croach Peter Moores, comes over at 200K Rand. He’s going to love working in tandem with fellow southpaw-keeper, Ryan Rickelton. 

Slots remaining: 7 | Purse remaining: 4M Rand

6:00pm local time: Born in Cape Town, will play for Cape Town! Jason Smith, fresh from his recent promotion to the Proteas senior squad, is all set to play for the Mother City, his city, our city. A homecoming, literally! He joins for his base price of 500K Rand. 

5:40pm local time: From the Rookie Draft in season 3 to the Auction in season 4 - Tristan Luus, the young promising quick, stays in MI Cape Town for 650K Rand. Oh we're loving' it. Newlands, excited already!!

A gun batter, a gun bowler, a gun fielder, a gun guy! Dwaine Pretorius, the South African pro, is all set to come to Cape Town at 650K Rand. He's all set to add some muscle to our middle-order. Fun fact: He holds the record for the best bowling figures by a South African in international T20s - 5/17. 

4:30pm local time: Oh, some further 2025 deja vu! Reeza Hendricks, another familiar face from our championship winning season, is back. The three Rs are intact: Rassie, Ryan, Reeza. 500k Rand, his base price, he comes home uncontested. 

RASSIE IS BACK!!!! The Rassie-Ryan combo at the top of the order that kept notching up big stands is all set to do the same in season 4. Rassie van der Dussen, welcome back to the Blue and Gold. He did attract a fair bidding war, but we weren't letting him go. He's ours at 5.2 million Rand. 

2:30pm local time: Some breakneck action out there in the middle. Big names have come, big money has been splurged. MI Cape Town have been rather watchful. It's coming, it's coming..

2pm local time: Threeee, twoooo, oneee, WE ARE LIVE. Tell us your dream list, Kaapstad! 

And for everything MICT, here’s your cheat sheet with all your FAQs answered: 

So here’s the run-order for the day:

• The Auction begins at 2pm local time
   
• A total of 546 players have registered themselves for the 84 slots available across teams
   
• There are three Marquee sets comprising of seven players each, followed by two sets of batters, fast bowlers, spin bowlers, wicket-keepers and all-rounders
   
• Once done, we would move into an express auction round where the players unsold in the first round could re-enter potentially as well
   
• The players have selected reserve (base) prices for themselves as follows: 200000 Rand, 500000 Rand, 1000000 Rand and 1500000 Rand. 

1:30pm local time: IT’S AUCTION DAY. Selling once, selling twice, AND SOLD. We have a crown to defend, the crown of champions, and it all starts here. Tonight. With 11.5million Rand in our kitty and 12 players to purchase, we are in for a shopping spree. We’ve retained our core from the winning 2024 squad, and we could potentially be getting a few of them back from the auction. Oh, we are in for a rollercoaster of an evening. And this is your space for all the buys, the misses, the oh-so-there, steals and all that happens around the gavel in Jo’burg from an MI Cape Town lens, with some fun hopefully along the way. Stay tuned, live action isn’t far away ..