Ravindra Jadeja, the buzzword
Mumbai: On Saturday, when Richard Madley, a professional auctioneer from England, will announce the name of Ravindra Jadeja during the IPL auction, one could witness a fight to the finish between the team owners to get this former Kochi Tuskers all-rounder.
Though there are 146 players in the auction, the only name that is doing the rounds is that of Jadeja, who is likely to touch the $2 million mark and his fate could well be decided by tie-breaker.
In Jadeja's case, three teams ' Royal Challengers Bangalore, Pune Warriors and Kings XI Punjab ' could be termed to be out of contention as they don't have their full purse of $2 million having retained one player each before the auction.
While Jadeja will be hogging all the limelight, the fate of several former Kochi Tuskers Kerala players will also be decided during the auction.
Brendon McCullum, Mahela Jayawardene, Muttiah Muralitharan, R Vinay Kumar and Parthiv Patel will be other sought after players hoping to get a better pay packet but more importantly, a team to play.
Two Pakistani players will also go under the hammer. One of them, Azhar Mahmood, has played for Pakistan, but is now a British citizen. The other is South Africa's Imran Tahir, who had also played for Pakistan A. It will be interesting to see whether teams do bid for them unlike in 2010 when Pakistan players remained unsold.
Though several international players have been included in the auction, teams will be careful before bidding for them as many countries will be playing international cricket during the tournament.
The auction will be a test of money management for the teams with a low purse. Also, it will be interesting to see if any player can spring a surprise bid. It is believed that only 37 players out of the 146 in the fray will get sold.
Meanwhile, a pre-auction meeting was held in Bangalore in which it was revealed that Chris Tremlett would not be fit for IPL 5.
The England pacer had a base price of 200,000. However, the franchises were told that there are still questions marks over S Sreesanth's readiness for the league, which starts on April 4.
Sreesanth was one of the players of the Kochi IPL team. Sreesanth has not played since August last year. He has a base price of 400,000.
Also, it was revealed that Mitchell Johnson, out of action for three months, is unlikely to be would be fit for the tournament.
News Posted: 4 February, 2012
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