LAHORE: The Pakistan Cricket Board on Saturday announced that it has approved 10 bidders after completing the technical evaluation of the proposals for the sale of two new franchises of the Pakistan Super League.

The auction for the two teams is slated for Jan 8 in Islamabad and comes after the PCB, which had received 12 proposals, had earlier said that investors from the United States, Australia, Canada, the United Arab Emirates and Pakistan expressed their interest in acquiring the franchises up for sale.

“A total of 12 proposals were received from interested parties within the stipulated deadline from across the globe and were scrutinised by the PCB Bid Committee over the last three days,” PCB said in a statement.

“Following a thorough and transparent evaluation process, the PCB Bid Committee has qualified 10 bidders who have successfully met the technical criteria and now enter the second stage.

“These 10 technically qualified bidders will now proceed to participate in the auction scheduled on Thursday, 8 January, 2026 at the Jinnah Convention Centre in Islamabad, where the franchise rights for the two new HBL PSL teams will be up for grabs.

“At the auction, the successful bidders will have the right to choose their franchise team names from amongst the following: Rawalpindi, Hyderabad, Faisalabad, Gilgit, Muzaffarabad and Sialkot.”

PSL chief executive officer Salman Naseer said that the league, which will expand to eight teams by the coming edition, “appreciates the strong interest shown by both local and international investors”.

“The league looks forward to achieving another significant milestone in the expansion and evolution of the PSL as we now prepare for the eagerly awaited auction,” he was quoted as saying in the statement.