BIG GUNS BITE DUST
Ganguly, Lara, Gayle, Jayasuriya find no takers
PTI
BANGALORE, JAN 9
Reputations counted for little as former India captain Sourav Ganguly and several other big names found no takers for the fourth edition of the IPL even as unheralded Australian Daniel Christian was bought for an astounding USD 900,000 (Rs 4.14 crore approx) on the second day of the auction here today.
Veteran Sri Lankan batsman Sanath Jayasuriya also failed to find a buyer today joining a high-profile list of unsold players which included among others West Indies batting great Brian Lara, Chris Gayle, Mark Boucher and Graeme Swann.
Ganguly’s name, in fact, did not even come up in the second round of bidding, the players for which were handpicked by the franchises, prompting angry fans to stage protests against his former team Kolkata Knight Riders in the Bengal capital.
A total of 241 of the 353 players in fray went unsold in the first round of auctions, which spanned over two days. 28 players came up for a re-auctioning on the request of the franchises but again some of them strangely went unsold.
New Zealand’s hard-hitting batsman Jesse Ryder (Pune, USD 150,000), spinner Murali Karthik (Pune, USD 400,000) and Mohammad Kaif (Bangalore, USD 130,000) were among the lucky 12 who managed to sneak through into the cash-rich event.
At the end of the two-day auction all the franchises still had some money left from the USD nine million cap on a rather dull second day considering that Gautam Gambhir had gone for a record Rs 11.04 crore to KKR on the first day.
In a relatively low-key day, it was Christian who hogged the limelight as he was bought by Deccan 18 times more than his base price of USD 50,000.
No one could have even imagined that the 27-year-old from New South Wales will go for such a high price. He has played just three Twenty20 internationals for Australia and is primarily a fast bowler who can hit a long way in the lower order.
“We believe Dan Christian is a good buy. He is good fast bowler and a decent batsman. He is also a brilliant fielder”, Deccan Chargers owner Gayathri Reddy said.
