We can all admit that the Indian Premier
League (IPL) has seen its share of crescendos and crashes over the years. While
the degree of interest for the event itself can be questioned , the life and
story of its auction is separate and distinct in itself.
There is something very exciting and sad in
watching the ‘auction’ of cricket players (as if they are mere livestock
or something). Fortunes can be made and lost over minute strategies and major
egos of the team owners and their strategies.
The seasons before saw atrocious amounts
paid for players like Pawan Negi , Yuvaraj Singh , Dinesh Karthik , the Pathan
brothers only for them to get weighed down by their exorbitant salaries.
Hitherto unknown players like Paul
Valthathy , Praveen Tambe can thank the IPL for truly changing their life and
bringing them much needed recognition. And that is the beauty of IPL , the
conventional routes are so filled with politics and this is an alternate path
which can boost you into the selectors radar or could set you up in a
specialist T20 career of being good at one skill like bowling Yorkers or a
specialist at slower balls ( Vinay Kumar comes to my mind immediately)
This year’s IPL auction was comparatively more
subdued one since most teams are pros at knowing what they want by now. Coaches
like Sehwag chalked out how teams stuck to their budgets and only bidded a bit
outside of it. Also , next year we have the mega auction where players may only
be retained minimally and everyone goes for sale! ( Can’t wait for that to
happen xD)
Let us go on a small overview of how all
the teams faired in their auctions.
1) King
Xi Punjab – This midlevel team usually punches above its weight but last year
was abysmal for them. They didn’t have a captain coming in this year and they
seemed to have solved it by buying Eoin Morgan ( whose performance in the IPL
has not been so good and English players are only available for a limited
period this season) . They have spent heavily on uncapped T.Natarajan , a Tamil
Nadu fast bowler , interesting to see what he brings to the table and Varun
Aaron could be their answer for frontline ‘fast’ Indian bowler. The kings xi
selectors managed to buy Martin Guptill , the destructive opener and Darren
Sammy the West Indies all rounder captain at throwaway prices. I feel that
these 2 buys could alter the scales in their favour. However , Axar patel seems
to be the only recognizable spinner in their line up. They could have invested
in better known Indian spinners.
2) Royal
Challengers Bangalore – Usually known for its flashy team owner and exorbitant
ego buys , RCB this year didn’t buy big ( in terms of glamour) . That maybe due
to the fact that they already have to pay so much for their fancy players like
Kohli and De Villiers. They seemed to have narrowed their problem to their
Achilles heels – their bowling. They have tried to fill the big boots of
Mitchell Starc with literally big men – T.Mills ( who was bought for a whopping
12 crores) , Aneekeet Choudary ( who apparently bowled to Kohli in the nets as
proxy for tall foreign bowlers) and the foreign Billy Stanlake. They have also
bought Pawan negi ( off spinner) and Praveen Dubey ( leg breaks) . Hopefully
this solves their bowling woes for the forthcoming year.
3) Delhi
Daredevils – Usually known for their smart Indian buys , thanks to a certain
Rahul Dravid , this year they have gone all out and filled all their foreign
slots! They have bought the useful but injured Angelo Mathews , mostly
misfiring Corey Anderson , pace machines Rabada and Pat Cummins . I think they
are set on their Indian batsmen – Shreyas Iyer , Rishabh Pant , Karun Nair and
Sanju Samson since the foreign players are mostly all rounders rather than
traditional batsmen. Their spin is mostly spearheaded by Mishra and Jayant
yadav , since they have bought only Murugan Ashwin as their known spinner. They
seem to have a squad set for all conditions , hope they don’t fall into the pit
of too many changes and fall short of playoffs like they usually do.
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