Kathmandu Gurkhas, a premier franchise of Kathmandu Sports Development Ventures, has selected Krish Karki as their local iconic player for the upcoming Nepal Premier League T20 cricket tournament.

Karki earned his spot in the Gurkhas squad on Saturday, during the final day of the talent hunt held at One Day Cricket Academy at Kandaghari, Kathmandu.

The talent hunt had started on Tuesday. About 500 players registered their names for the talent hunt. Preliminary selections were held at Cricket Excellence Centre (CEC) Baluwatar, CEC Bhaktapur and The Great Himalaya Cricket Academy Lalitpur.

Karki succeeded to secure the coveted seat from among a total of 32 players who were shortlisted for the final selection.

NPL player recruitment guidelines require all the participating teams to select a local iconic player through talent hunt, focusing on the province the franchise team represents.

Gurkhas had targeted districts like Kathmandu, Lalitpur, Bhaktapur and Nuwakot of Bagmati Province for their talent hunt to identify and recruit the iconic player.

Karki is from Bhaktapur.

The Gurkhas have also inducted six other best players: Bipin Neupane, Asim Shrestha, Atharva Paudel, Shardul Bhatta, Rajendra Bam and Kamal Gupta.

According to Gurkhas head coach Basanta Shahi, the franchise team have decided to reward the six players with Rs25,000 as a gesture of encouragement.

Karki will get Rs100,000 as per the NPL player recruitment guidelines, which mandate that teams offer a fixed contract amount of Rs100,000 to their local iconic player.

National cricketer Karan KC is the marquee player of the Gurkhas, who have also secured the service of Shahab Alam, Bhim Sarki, Rashid Khan, Shankar Rana, Krishna Karki, Dipesh Kadel, Sumit Maharjan, Raju Rizal, Vivek KC and Pratik Shrestha through the auction.

English cricketers Dan Douthwaite and Stevie Sean Eskinazi, the Netherlands opener Michael Levitt, Namibia captain Gerhard Erasmus will join the Gurkhas as overseas signings.