The player auction for IPL 2021 took place on 18th February 2021 in Chennai. The 8 franchises (Chennai Super Kings, Punjab Kings, Royal Challengers Bangalore, Sunrisers Hyderabad, Rajasthan Royals, Kolkata Knight Riders, Delhi Capitals, and Mumbai Indians) spent a total of Rs.145.3 Crore on 57 players. The IPL auction had a total of 292 players- 164 Indian and 125 overseas.
The auction started off with some big names like Alex Hales, Jason Roy and Karun Nair going unsold. Steve Smith was the first big buy of the day, going for comparatively minimal Rs.2.2cr to DC. Global T20 stars Aaron Finch and Evan Lewis came up next but they did not attract any big buyers.
Glenn Maxwell ignited the first bidding war of the day, with RR and KKR starting off the proceedings and RCB and CSK taking over. He was finally sold for Rs.14.25cr to RCB, becoming one of the highest-paid players in IPL history. Maxwell has a history of going for high prices, with Punjab buying him for Rs.10.75cr in the past. He gained an increment of Rs.3.5cr despite having poor returns in IPL 2020, largely due to his current form in Big Bash and his overall T20 record.
Subcontinent all-rounder Shakib Al Hasan and Shivam Dube went for Rs.3.20cr and Rs.4.4cr to KKR and RR respectively. Moeen Ali who impressed with his big-hitting towards the end of the 2nd Ind vs Eng test in Chennai went for Rs.7cr to CSK.
Chris Morris, the veteran South African allrounder, went for a whopping Rs16.25cr to RR becoming the highest-paid player to be bought via IPL auction and the second-highest-paid IPL player, only behind RCB skipper Virat Kohli who is paid Rs.17cr every season.
MI snapped up 2 seamers- Adam Milne and Nathan Coulter-Nile for the price of Rs.3.2cr and Rs.5cr respectively bolstering their already strong bowling lineup. Umesh Yadav, another premier fast bowler surprisingly went for his base price of Rs.1cr. Shaun Marsh, Darren Bravo, Rovman Powell, Martin Guptil and Sandeep Lamichhane also went unsold.
Jhye Richardson was another seamer who started a bidding war. He went to PBKS, formerly KXIP, for a whopping Rs.14cr after ending up as the leading wicket-taker in the Big Bash 2020. However, he also went for runs towards the business end of the tournament with an economy of 8.44.
Kyle Jamieson also witnessed a huge payday with RCB putting up a humongous Rs.15cr for the Kiwi Seamer. He has impressed with his talent on the green tracks of New Zealand with steep bounce and movement off the pitch but remains largely untested in the subcontinent conditions where the tracks are flatter with a lot less grass on it.
Windies pacer Sheldon Cottrell and England spinner Adil Rashid failed to attract any bids, while veteran Indian spinner Piyush Chawla and Bangladesh pacer Mustafizur Rahman went for Rs.2.4cr and Rs.1cr to MI and RR respectively.
Largely due to their performances in the domestic T20 tournaments, many uncapped players also found bidders this season. Sachin Baby, Mohammed Azharuddin and Rajat Patidar went to RCB, while Ripal Patel and Vishnu Vinod went to DC for their base price of Rs.20 lakhs. Arjun Tendulkar, the son of the legendary Sachin Tendulkar, was signed by MI for Rs.20 lakhs as well.
Three uncapped players, in particular, attracted a lot of attention from franchises. Shahrukh Khan went to PBKS for Rs.5.25cr for the display of his explosive batting skills in the domestic circuit. Krishnappa Gowtham became the highest paid uncapped player in an IPL auction going to CSK for Rs.9.25cr. Chetan Sakariya went for Rs.1.2cr to RR, thanks to his fast bowling skills.
Tom Curran(Rs.5.25cr), Moises Henriques(Rs.4.2cr), and Daniel Christian(Rs.4.8cr) attracted the interest of franchisees, going to DC, PBKS, and RCB respectively. Cheteshwar Pujara was also picked by CSK for Rs.50 lakhs, after going unsold for the last 6 years.
Harbhajan Singh, Kedhar Jadhav, Sam Billings, and Karun Nair, who went unsold in the first round of the auction, were picked up in the second round by KKR, SRH, DC, and KKR respectively. Jason Behrendorff, Corey Anderson, Hanuma Vihari, and Rasee van der Dussen went unsold.
At the end of the auction, this is how the squads stand:
Delhi Capitals
Shreyas Iyer (c), Shikhar Dhawan, Prithvi Shaw, Ajinkya Rahane, Rishabh Pant (wk), Shimron Hetmyer, Marcus Stoinis, Chris Woakes, R Ashwin, Axar Patel, Amit Mishra, Lalit Yadav, Pravin Dubey, Kagiso Rabada, Anrich Nortje, Ishant Sharma, Avesh Khan, Steve Smith, Umesh Yadav, Ripal Patel, Vishnu Vinod, Lukman Meriwala, M Siddarth, Tom Curran, Sam Billings
Mumbai Indians
Rohit Sharma (c), Quinton de Kock (wk), Ishan Kishan (wk), Suryakumar Yadav, Chris Lynn, Saurabh Tiwary, Anmolpreet Singh, Aditya Tare (wk), Kieron Pollard, Hardik Pandya, Krunal Pandya, Rahul Chahar, Jayant Yadav, Anukul Roy, Jasprit Bumrah, Trent Boult, Dhawal Kulkarni, Mohsin Khan, Adam Milne, Nathan Coulter-Nile, Piyush Chawla, James Neesham, Yudhvir Charak, Marco Jansen, Arjun Tendulkar
Rajasthan Royals
Sanju Samson (c&wk), Jos Buttler (wk), Ben Stokes, Yashasvi Jaiswal, Manan Vohra, Anuj Rawat, Riyan Parag, David Miller, Rahul Tewatia, Mahipal Lomror, Shreyas Gopal, Mayank Markande, Jofra Archer, Andrew Tye, Jaydev Unadkat, Kartik Tyagi, Shivam Dube, Chris Morris, Mustafizur Rahman, Chetan Sakariya, KC Cariappa, Liam Livingstone, Kuldip Yadav, Akash Singh
Chennai Super Kings
Faf du Plessis, Ruturaj Gaikwad, Suresh Raina, Ambati Rayudu, N. Jagadeesan (wk), Robin Uthappa, MS Dhoni (c&wk), Ravindra Jadeja, Sam Curran, Dwayne Bravo, Karn Sharma, R. Sai Kishore, Mitchell Santner, Imran Tahir, Deepak Chahar, Shardul Thakur, Lungi Ngidi, Josh Hazlewood, KM Asif, Moeen Ali, K Gowtham, Cheteshwar Pujara, M Harisankar Reddy, K. Bhagath Varma, C Hari Nishanth
Sunrisers Hyderabad
David Warner (c), Kane Williamson, Jonny Bairstow (wk), Manish Pandey, Sreevats Goswami (wk), Wriddhiman Saha (wk), Priyam Garg, Vijay Shankar, Abhishek Sharma, Abdul Samad, Virat Singh, Mitchell Marsh, Jason Holder, Mohammad Nabi, Rashid Khan, Shahbaz Nadeem, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, T. Natarajan, Sandeep Sharma, Khaleel Ahmed, Siddarth Kaul, Basil Thampi, Jagadeesha Suchith, Kedar Jadhav, Mujeeb-ur-Rahman
Punjab Kings
KL Rahul (c&wk), Mayank Agarwal, Chris Gayle, Mandeep Singh, Prabsimran Singh, Nicholas Pooran (wk), Sarfaraz Khan, Deepak Hooda, Murugan Ashwin, Ravi Bishnoi, Harpreet Brar, Mohammed Shami, Arshdeep Singh, Ishan Porel, Darshan Nalkande, Chris Jordan, Dawid Malan, Jhye Richardson, Shahrukh Khan, Riley Meredith, Moises Henriques, Jalaj Saxena, Utkarsh Singh, Fabian Allen, Saurabh Kumar
Kolkata Knight Riders
Shubman Gill, Nitish Rana, Tim Seifert (wk), Rahul Tripathi, Rinku Singh, Dinesh Karthik (wk), Eoin Morgan (c), Andre Russell, Sunil Narine, Varun CV, Kuldeep Yadav, Pat Cummins, Lockie Ferguson, Kamlesh Nagarkoti, Shivam Mavi, Sandeep Warrier, Prasidh Krishna, Shakib Al Hasan, Sheldon Jackson, Vaibhav Arora, Karun Nair, Harbhajan Singh, Ben Cutting, Venkatesh Iyer, Pawan Negi
Royal Challengers Bangalore
Virat Kohli (c), Devdutt Padikkal, Josh Philippe (wk), AB de Villiers (wk), Pavan Deshpande, Washington Sundar, Daniel Sams, Yuzvendra Chahal, Adam Zampa, Shahbaz Ahmed, Mohammed Siraj, Navdeep Saini, Kane Richardson, Harshal Patel, Glenn Maxwell, Sachin Baby, Rajat Patidar, Mohammed Azharuddin, Kyle Jamieson, Daniel Christian, Suyash Prabhudessai, K.S. Bharat.
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