2020 IPL Auctions: The Review Part-I

The 2019 edition of the Indian Premier League (IPL) was a humdinger to the last ball of the tournament, which saw the Mumbai Indians wrest back their crown from their arch-nemesis and defending champions, the Chennai Super Kings by a margin of just 1 run. The year ended with the player auctions for the 2020 season on Thursday, 19^th December, 2019, which was the last one before the grand auction for the 2021 edition. So, without further ado, I would attempt to evaluate as to how the 8 sides performed on the auction table, as they attempted to go in for some of the biggest names today in world cricket and the “flavour-of-the-season” players. This would be a two-part article, with Part II coming soon.


Chennai Super Kings: -

• The runners-up from the previous edition came into this auction with a very settled and experienced squad and having the slot to buy a maximum of 5 players (having released 6 players from their previous squad which included the likes of David Willey and Sam Billings) and walked into the auction with a purse of Rs. 14.6 crores. With a pretty clear idea of giving their squad a bit of cover in their bowling spots, they opted to spend a handy Rs. 5.5 crores on English left-arm pace bowling all-rounder Sam Curran, who was released by the Kings XI Punjab, to give themselves a valuable backup to Dwayne Bravo, and they made another smart purchase in recruiting Aussie pacer Josh Hazlewood at his base price of Rs. 2 crores, who adds a frontline option for their pace attack considering the injury problems of their lead South African pacer Lungi Ngidi. Then they made probably the most surprising buy of this auction by buying veteran leg-spinner Piyush Chawla at a surprisingly high Rs. 6.75 crores, when they already had Imran Tahir and Karn Sharma in their ranks. They then rounded off their day by buying local lad R. Sai Kishore at his base price of Rs. 20 lakhs, whose left-arm spin helped him become the highest wicket-taker in this year’s Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy, which is India’s premier domestic T-20 competition for state teams. With most of their bases covered the Yellow Army look quite ready to regain their crown and mount a strong title challenge.

My Smart Pick: -

• From the four they purchased, in my opinion, the Chennai Super Kings made their smartest purchase in buying the English all-rounder Sam Curran for Rs. 5.5 crores. Chennai had struggled quite a lot last year when they did not have Dwayne Bravo available for a few games due to injury and with his advancing age, he’s losing a little of the sting that has made him one of the most sought-after all-rounders in the T20 format. Sam Curran fills that role quite well for Chennai and also offers them a variation with his left-arm pace bowling. It would be very interesting to see how Chennai use Curran and if used to his potential, he could turn out to be a major game-changer for their franchise.

Delhi Capitals: -

• Delhi had a highly successful season in 2019 after their name change as they went on to finish 3rd after losing to the Super Kings in the second qualifier, but released quite a few players, including their retained all-rounder Chris Morris, Colin Ingram, Colin Munro and Hanuma Vihari being amongst the high-profile names. They were very active in the pre-season trading window as well, where they let go of New Zealand’s superstar left-arm speedster Trent Boult and West Indian all-rounder Sherfane Rutherford to defending champions Mumbai Indians while letting go of Rahul Tewatia as well as leg-spinner Mayank Markande to Rajasthan Royals (whom they had traded in from the Mumbai Indians in the first place for Sherfane Rutherford) and also traded away left-arm spinner J. Suchith to Kings XI Punjab. They did make two blockbuster additions to their squad though, by trading in Ajinkya Rahane from Rajasthan Royals and then adding the off-spinner and Kings XI Punjab’s captain Ravichandran Ashwin, which further raised hopes that 2020 could perhaps be their year finally. Their auction strategy though came a little unstuck on the table. They emerged second-best in the bidding war for quite a few players like Eoin Morgan, Pat Cummins, Sheldon Cottrell & Sam Curran, and were thus forced to look for the next best alternatives. With a purse of Rs 27.85 crores, they spent a fair bit of that, Rs 7.75 crores to be exact, on West Indian batsman Shimron Hetmyer while making base price bids to sign the English duo of opener Jason Roy and bowling all-rounder Chris Woakes for Rs. 1.50 crores each, while towards the end, they spent another huge sum of Rs. 4.80 crores on Aussie all-rounder Marcus Stoinis while also spending Rs. 2.40 crores on the in-form Australian wicket-keeper Alex Carey, while bolstering their Indian contingent by signing pacers Mohit Sharma, Tushar Deshpande, and Delhi all-rounder Lalit Yadav to round off their auction. All in all, Delhi had a mixed auction and trading window and for them to repeat last year’s heroics and maybe go a step further, they would really need to get the balance of their playing 11 correct, otherwise, disaster could be round the corner for them.

My Smart Pick: -

• It’s kind of difficult for me to make my smart pick of the auction for Delhi, but if I have to make a pick here, then I’d pick Shimron Hetmyer, considering his recent run of form. While he had flattered to deceive in the previous IPL for the RCB, his sparkling run of form for the West Indies in their tour of India was able to draw the eyeballs of many and he would relish playing on the Delhi surface, considering his penchant to play spin bowling really well. If he can raise his game up a notch, Delhi Capitals would have on their hands one of the most power-packed middle orders amongst all the sides.

Kings XI Punjab: -

• Kings XI decided to reboot their entire backroom team after yet another disappointing season by letting go of Mike Hesson and his entire backroom staff and replaced him with Anil Kumble, while also releasing some big-money acquisitions such as Sam Curran, Varun Chakravarthy, David Miller and Andrew Tye, while also letting go of their captain Ravichandran Ashwin in a trade with the Delhi Capitals and also letting go of pacer Ankit Rajpoot to the Rajasthan Royals, while securing the Karnataka spin duo of J. Suchith and Krishnappa Gowtham from Delhi and Rajasthan Royals respectively. Walking into the auction with the highest purse available (Rs. 42.70 crores) and with 9 slots to fill (4 of them being for overseas players), it was expected that they would be in the thick of the auctions. They didn’t disappoint on that count, by bringing back the destructive Australian batsman Glenn Maxwell for a mammoth Rs. 10.75 crores and following that up by signing the in-form left-arm pacer Sheldon Cottrell of the West Indies for a huge Rs. 8.5 crores, while also signing India Under-19 leg spinner Ravi Bishnoi for a massive Rs. 2 crores and England pacer Chris Jordan for Rs. 3 crores. They then followed this up by signing up all-rounder Deepak Hooda for Rs. 50 lakh, the in-form young Bengal pacer Ishan Porel, and popular New Zealand all-rounder James Neesham at base price, while also signing Rajasthan all-rounder Tajinder Singh Dhillon and re-signing the young ‘keeper Prabh Simran Singh for Rs. 55 lakhs. If new captain KL Rahul and coach Anil Kumble can find a way to get the right balance to their playing 11 and tighten up on the weaknesses they had the previous time, then the Kings XI have the players who can on their day, hurt the strongest sides of the competition.

My Smart Pick: -

• It’s a slightly unfancied name that I’ve picked here for my smart auction pick for Kings XI, but for me, Ishan Porel at his base price is a steal for the Kings XI. Porel, who was teammates with Prithvi Shaw and Shubman Gill in the victorious 2018 Under-19 World Cup-winning Indian team has had a stupendous recent fun of form in domestic cricket, with great performances in both the Deodhar Trophy as well as the Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy, where his pace and ability to constantly hit the right line and length was noticed by the national selectors, who’ve now selected him into the India A squad on quite a few occasions. He would be in the front race to partner Mohammad Shami and Sheldon Cottrell in the Kings XI pace attack and a good IPL for him could open the doors for higher honours.

Kolkata Knight Riders: -

• Kolkata Knight Riders didn’t enjoy the best of seasons in 2019 with only Andre Russell and Shubman Gill giving them major reasons for joy, as they missed out on a playoff spot. This saw reshuffle not only their coaching staff with Jacques Kallis and Simon Katich quitting making way for Brendon McCullum to take over as the new head coach, but also saw them release a number of their big players such as Chris Lynn, Robin Uthappa, Carlos Brathwaite, and Piyush Chawla, who were on big-money contracts, which meant that they went into the auction with a massive Rs. 35.65 crores to buy a maximum of 11 players (including 4 overseas players). On auction day, they first spent a hefty Rs. 5.25 crores on bringing back England’s World Cup-winning captain Eoin Morgan and then making a massive bid of Rs. 15.50 crores to sign the Australian tearaway pacer Pat Cummins, who also returned to KKR, while spending Rs. 4 crores on Varun Chakravarthy, who had just the previous year, had cost the Kings XI Rs. 8.4 crores, but couldn’t play a lot due to fitness issues. They then rounded off their auction by signing opening batsman Rahul Tripathi as well as Tamil Nadu left-arm spinner M. Siddharth, the 48-year-old leg-spinner Pravin Tambe as well as ‘keeper-bat Nikhil Naik, while also making two extremely smart bargain purchases in signing the explosive England opener Tom Banton and the globe-trotting Australian off-spinner Chris Green on their base prices, after having impressed in major T20 leagues around the globe. If KKR’s team management can keep their players fit and firing, then they’ve got the squad that can make a massive title bid in 2020.

My Smart Pick: -

• No KKR purchase gave me the kind of excitement that the purchase of Tom Banton at his base price, no less. Banton had a breakout season in the 2019 T20 Blast in England where his flamboyant, no-holds-barred stroke play at the top of the Somerset batting lineup saw him smash 549 runs at a fabulous average of over 42 and an astonishing strike rate of 161.47, statistics which are quite frankly mind-boggling. His stunning season saw him get an England call-up in their T20 side for the tour of New Zealand, while also landing him a Big Bash League gig at the Brisbane Heat, where he’ll link up with a former Knight Rider in Chris Lynn. If Banton gets his chance at KKR and finds his range, then the bowlers would be given a one-way trip into Banton’s Hall of Hell.

Please do read this and offer your views and suggestions, while stay tuned for Part-II of the auction review.