IPL Auction 2021: 21 key highlights of the big bucks event

Indian Premier League (IPL) 2021 auction (Image: BCCI and Twitter/@IPL)

It was supposed to be a ‘mini-auction’. However, for many players across the world, it turned out to be a huge auction. In case if you didn’t follow the minute-by-minute action during the 2021 Indian Premier League (IPL) auction, here are the highlights:

Hero of the auction

Chris Morris has never picked 16 wickets in an IPL season. But this hardly mattered for the Rajasthan Royals who spent a record Rs 16.25 crore in the auction on him. The South African fast bowling all-rounder became the costliest purchase in the history of IPL and not just in this auction. Morris was sold 20 times above his base price because of the fierce bidding from four teams which also included his former team Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) that had released him earlier.

Auction for the most expensive players

About 40 percent of the most expensive players from the history of IPL have now come from this batch of the 2021 auction. It was way back in 2014 when more than one player of the top-10 of all-time most expensive players came from a single auction.

It didn’t rain but poured for overseas players

Not only for Morris but the top 10 highest-getters of the auction were dominated by the overseas players -- with Krishnappa Gowtham and Shahrukh Khan being the only two Indians.

Glenn does the Maximum-well

As expected, there was a bidding war for Australian Glenn Maxwell who, by now, has got used to such frenetic chase by franchises during auctions. Maxwell was a big flop in 2020 for Punjab and failed to even hit a six. But that didn’t matter to MS Dhoni’s Chennai Super Kings (CSK) and Virat Kohli’s RCB as they went after each other in chasing the underperforming Maxwell.

The tallest ever Kiwi pacer is the second tallest buy

Kyle Jamieson is the tallest ever New Zealand pace bowler who emerged as the second highest buy of the auction with the RCB spending Rs 15 crore for him.

The luckiest duo

England’s Tom Curran barely managed to break into the playing XI of the Rajasthan Royals in 2020 and when he did, he wasn’t spectacularly successful either. Yet, Delhi Capitals got him for Rs 5.25 crore. The relatively unknown Australian pacer Riley Meridith was luckier than Curran who was picked by Punjab Kings for a whopping Rs 8 crore. Meridith is now the costliest uncapped overseas player ever.

Over-estimation proved costly

Alex Hales (base price Rs 1.5 crore), Jason Roy (Rs 2 crore), Marnus Labuschagne (Rs 1 crore) and Aaron Finch (Rs 1 crore) had no takers, possibly because of the over-estimated  base price.

Feel-good buy of the auction

Undoubtedly, this has to be Cheteshwar Pujara’s return in IPL after a gap of six years. Pujara was picked by CSK for his base price of Rs 50 lakh but this may just revive his IPL career.

Surprisingly unsold

New Zealand’s Mitchell McClenaghan has been one of the silent assassin for the Mumbai Indians over the years. A left-arm quick bowler who is also handy with bat had a base price of just Rs 50 lakh. Yet, he went unsold.

CSK’s love affair with 30+ continues

With Moeen Ali’s inclusion for a whopping Rs 7 crore, CSK has once again proved that they just have some special liking for the players who are over the age of 30.

3 players’ total bid more than the entire purse of 3 teams combined

Between the three – Maxwell, Morris and Jhye Richardson – Rs 44.5 crore were spent, which was more than the combined purse of the Sunrisers Hyderabad, Kolkata Knight Riders (each had Rs 10.75 crore) and the Delhi Capitals (Rs 13.4 crore).

SRH waited for ‘sale’

Hyderabad waited patiently and were rewarded for it when they picked Kedar Jadhav (Rs 2 crore) and Mujeeb Ur Rehman (Rs 1.5 crore) for their base price during the last phase of auction as there were no takers for them in the beginning.

Auction’s forever champion Mumbai

By getting Piyush Chawla (IPL’s third most successful spinner for just Rs 2.4 crore, Mumbai once again proved that they begin their campaign from the auction itself by informed selections.

DC’s Australian tilt

How would you explain Steven Smith’s entry in Delhi even if it was for just Rs 2.2 crore? They already have similar kind of players in Ajinkya Rahane, Shikhar Dhawan and captain Shreyas Iyer who all bat in the top-order. Perhaps, head coach Ricky Ponting’s nationality may have helped Smith.

KKR got their lucky player back

Shakib Al Hasan was picked by KKR just for Rs 3.2 crore. The Bangladeshi all-rounder was a crucial factor for his former team when they won the title in 2012 and 2014.

A tale of two-buys for Punjab

It was sort of a mixed bag for Punjab Kings who went into the auction with the biggest purse of Rs 53.20 crore. Yet, it was a tale of two extreme buys which sums up their outing in the auction. If Punjab were lucky to get England opener and the top-ranked T20I batsman Dawid Malan for his base price of Rs 1.5 crore, they then went in the other extreme by splurging Rs 14 crore on Jhye Richardson.

The first timer desi crorepatis

Shahrukh Khan (bought for Rs 5.25 crore by Punjab Kings) was always supposed to be one of the stars to emerge from this auction but it was the entry of Chetan Sakariya (bought for Rs 1.2 crore by Rajasthan Royals) in the first timer desi crorepatis’s club which surprised many pundits.

Old will prove gold for RCB?

Almost every season RCB comes in news for their seemingly bizarre decisions during auctions. The picking of Australia's 37-year-old all-rounder Dan Christian for Rs 4.8 crore (his base price of Rs 75 lakh) falls under this category.

Lucky escape for Harbhajan

Harbhajan Singh was expected to be picked by his home state Punjab but almost went unsold. The veteran avoided the ignominy when KKR bought him in the last round for his base price of Rs 2 crore.

The ‘Rs 20 lakh’ dark-horses

M Siddharth (bought by DC) is a left-arm spinner from Tamil Nadu, Ripal Patel (bought by DC) is a hard-hitting batsman from Gujarat, Mohammed Azharuddeen (bought by RCB) is a wicketkeeper-batsman from Kerala, Lukman Meriwala (bought by DC) is a left-arm pacer from Baroda, Utkarsh Singh (bought by Punjab Kings) is an all-rounder from Jharkahnd, Rajat Patidar (bought by RCB) is a batsman from Indore, Vaibhav Arora (bought by KKR) is a pacer from Himachal Pradesh, KS Bharat (bought by RCB) is being seen as a future India wicket-keeper from Andhra Pradesh, Harishankar Reddy (bought by CSK) is a fine bowler and C Hari Nishanth (bought by CSK) is a  left-hand opening batsman.

Besides all of them being uncapped India players, the one thing which is common among them is that they all are picked on their base price of Rs 20 lakh but could be the dark horse of this IPL.

Last but not the least

There was always a sense of inevitability that the most famous surname in cricket was always going to the city of his birth. Sachin Tendulkar’s son Arjun was the last name to come out in the auction but going to Mumbai Indians for Rs 20 lakh was always the first thought on many experts’ minds.