IPL Auction, or the KTK fire sale as BCCI internally termed it, was a mixed bag. It did have mad frenzied bidding, a couple of millionaire players, a bunch of bargain buys and a whole lot of discarded players. What it did not have, however ,is the usual drama associated with the IPL auction. Unless you count the fit thrown by Sahara India.
In fact the biggest drama of the day was over within the first 10 minutes. As expected 2 run outs, 1 catch and 1 wicket by Jadeja, in an inconsequential match mind you, were enough to convince CSK and DC that he was the best thing since sliced bread. Needless to say they wasted everyone’s time by going on bidding till 2 million before they had to settle it with my-wallet-is-deeper-than-yours.
Next more memorable bidding was for Mahela Jayawardene. Yes, teams bid for him for a T20 tournament. Not just one but two, DD and DC. Their combined stupidity sent his price for $1.4 million. Now consider this, Gibbs was snapped up by MI for $50,000. Better fielder and much more explosive bastman for 1/28th the price! Thankfully DD didn’t complete their set of useless T20 batsmen by letting VVS go unsold.
Just to put things in to perspective, Murali was bought by RCB for just $220,000. It is a different story altogether that they paid $1,000,000 for, hold your breath, R Vinay Kumar! The latter seemed to have added 5 km/h to RVK’s pace when India played today. But didn’t help India win. RCB should hope it works or them.
RCB weren’t the only ones with a brain fade. DC splurged another $650,000 on Parthiv Patel. Now consider the fact that RR paid $50,000 for Chandimal which just might be the bargain of the year. I am not sure what PP is supposed to do. If he plans to drop catches then Sangakkara is already there and if he plans to score runs, there any more ahead of him.
RR continued their obsession with past it Australian pensioners by picked up Hogg and Hodge to replace Warne. And to make things worse they picked up Sreesanth for $400,000 despite his injury and a lack of brain. For the World’s zombie cricketer that’s a lot of price to pay.
MI’s strategy seemed to be to hikeu o the prices of the players their opponents really wanted by needlessly bidding without any intent to buy, and it nearly did work. However, MI did the best bit of businesses this auction. Not only did they transfer DK and Ojha, they also picked up Perera, RP Singh, Mitchell Johnson, Robin Peterson, and Gibbs.
RCB were the luckiest team of the auction though, being allowed to keep Gayle for just $550,000. No wonder Sahara were mighty pissed! Especially when they get Ganguly in exchange for Yuvraj.
For McCullum it was happy homecoming as KKR took him back for $900,000 but Narine went from no one to $700,000 (more expensive then Chris Gayle) cricketer as KKR warded off competition to land him.
DD transferred in KP and bought Russell but still don’t know how they plan to make up for lack of quality spinners? Jayawardene and KP to bowl their offies?
KXIP were the biggest losers. They gave DK away and ended up with Romesh Powar and Sir Azhar Mahmood (apart from a bunch of no name players). If they had a strategy it was not visible.
Pune Warriors made their presence felt with their absence.