Image courtesy of: ESPNcricinfo

It is that time of the year again when the Indian Premier League (IPL) franchises have to think long and hard about which players they want to keep hold of and which ones they can afford to release.

With that in mind, here are the players released and retained by each IPL team.

Rising Pune Supergiants

Players released (11) Kevin Pietersen, Ishant Sharma, Irfan Pathan, Thisara Perera, RP Singh, Scott Boland, M Ashwin, Peter Handscomb, Saurabh Tiwary, Albie Morkel, George Bailey

Players retained (16) MS Dhoni, Ajinkya Rahane, R Ashwin, Steven Smith, Faf du Plessis, Mitchell Marsh, Ashok Dinda, Ankush Bains, Rajat Bhatia, Ankit Sharma, Ishwar Pandey, Adam Zampa, Jaskaran Singh, Baba Aparajith, Deepak Chahar, Usman Khawaja

Gujarat Lions

Players released (8) Dale Steyn, Paras Dogra, Eklavya Dwivedi, Sarabjit Ladda, Pravin Tambe, Umang Sharma, Amit Mishra (UP fast bowler), Akshdeep Nath

Players retained (16) Suresh Raina, Ravindra Jadeja, James Faulkner, Brendon McCullum, Dwayne Bravo, Aaron Finch, Dwayne Smith, Dinesh Karthik, Dhawal Kulkarni, Praveen Kumar, Andrew Tye, Ishan Kishan, Pradeep Sangwan, Shivil Kaushik, Shadab Jakati, Jaydev Shah

Kings XI Punjab

Players released (4) Mitchell Johnson, Rishi Dhawan, Kyle Abbott, Farhaan Behardien

Players retained (19) David Miller, Manan Vohra, Axar Patel, Glenn Maxwell, Gurkeerat Singh, Anureet Singh, Sandeep Sharma, Shardul Thakur, Shaun Marsh, Wriddhiman Saha, M Vijay, Nikhil Naik, Mohit Sharma, Marcus Stoinis, KC Cariappa, Armaan Jaffer, Pardeep Sahu, Swapnil Singh, Hashim Amla

Kolkata Knight Riders

Players released (9) Morne Morkel, Brad Hogg, Jason Holder, Colin Munro, John Hastings, Jaydev Unadkat, R Sathish, Manan Sharma, Shaun Tait

Players retained (14) Gautam Gambhir, Sunil Narine, Andre Russell, Kuldeep Yadav, Manish Pandey, Suryakumar Yadav, Piyush Chawla, Robin Uthappa, Shakib Al Hasan, Chris Lynn, Umesh Yadav, Yusuf Pathan, Sheldon Jackson, Ankit Singh Rajput

Mumbai Indians

Players released (8) Corey Anderson, Marchant de Lange, Unmukt Chand, Akshay Wakhare, Nathu Singh, Kishore Kamath, Martin Guptill, Jerome Taylor

Players retained (20) Rohit Sharma, Kieron Pollard, Lasith Malinga, Harbhajan Singh, Ambati Rayudu, Jasprit Bumrah, Shreyas Gopal, Lendl Simmons, Vinay Kumar, Parthiv Patel, Mitchell McClenaghan, Nitish Rana, Siddhesh Lad, J Suchith, Hardik Pandya, Jos Buttler, Tim Southee, Jithesh Sharma, Krunal Pandya, Deepak Punia

Delhi Daredevils

Players released (7) Nathan Coulter-Nile, Imran Tahir, Joel Paris, Pawan Negi, Pawan Suyal, Akhil Herwadkar, Mahipal Lomror,

Players retained (18) JP Duminy, Mohammed Shami, Quinton de Kock, Shahbaz Nadeem, Mayank Agarwal, Jayant Yadav, Amit Mishra, Shreyas Iyer, Zaheer Khan, Sam Billings, Sanju Samson, Chris Morris, Carlos Brathwaite, Karun Nair, Rishabh Pant, CV Milind, Syed Ahmed, Pratyush Singh

Royal Challengers Bangalore

Players released (10) Varun Aaron, Abu Nechim, David Wiese, Kane Richardson, Vikramjeet Malik, Praveen Dubey, Akshay Karnewar, Vikas Tokas, Parvez Rasool, Chris Jordan

Players retained (20) Virat Kohli, AB de Villiers, Chris Gayle, Mitchell Starc, Yuzvendra Chahal, Harshal Patel, Mandeep Singh, Adam Milne, Sarfaraz Khan, S Aravind, Kedar Jadhav, Shane Watson, Stuart Binny, Samuel Badree, Travis Head, Sachin Baby, Iqbal Abdulla, KL Rahul, Avesh Khan, Tabraiz Shamsi

Sunrisers Hyderabad

Players released (6) Karn Sharma, Ashish Reddy, Eoin Morgan, Trent Boult, T Suman, Aditya Tare

Players retained (17) Shikhar Dhawan, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, David Warner, Moises Henriques, Naman Ojha, Ricky Bhui, Kane Williamson, Siddarth Kaul, Bipul Sharma, Ashish Nehra, Yuvraj Singh, Ben Cutting, Abhimanyu Mithun, Mustafizur Rahman, Barinder Sran, Deepak Hooda, Vijay Shankar