Idea of IPL Auction revealed to be a random suggestion in an evening tea party

The Indian Premier League (IPL) is only 12 seasons younger than any other leagues in the world. However, the success of its previous editions hailed it as one of the most influential cricket tournaments and the cash-rich league in India. As it grows, ideas of improving the league have emerged including the very interesting IPL Auction. How it begun was revealed by former IPL official earlier this week.

Former IPL Chief Operating Officer (COO) Sundar Ramangave gave an insight into how the idea of players’ auction was discussed and later introduced prior to the first edition of the tournament in 2008. “It almost came out as an evening tea conversation while we were doing hundred thousand things,” Raman said in an interview for the show 22 Yarns with Gaurav Kapur.

The IPL auctions are given as much importance as the tournament itself just like how football treats Transfer Markets. “The only thing sure was the marquee players, who were assigned to a set of franchises. There was Sachin Tendulkar for Mumbai, Virender Sehwag for Delhi, Yuvraj Singh for Punjab, Sourav Ganguly for Kolkata. But MS Dhoni was without a home,” Raman said.

“The challenge was one of those conversations where the question was how do we make the franchises take on the players? One of the franchises, I don’t remember who it was, said ‘why don’t we auction them?’ After two minutes of deliberation I said ‘good idea, it will generate a lot of consumer interest’. And that decided that,” Raman explained.

Raman and Kapur then went on to talk about how stalwarts Mahendra Singh Dhoni and Virat Kohli found their respective teams in the first-ever auction. Player Auction is one way to acquire a player in a team. Players sign up for the auction and also set their base price, and are bought by the franchise that bids the highest for them. Unsold players at the auction are eligible to be signed up as replacement.

Pat Cummins sits at the top of the most expensive player sold in the IPL. He was sold for a whopping Rs 15.50 crore to Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR). His figures went past England all-rounder Ben Stokes’ auction bid of Rs 14.5 crores made at the IPL 2017 auctions. Australian all-rounder Glenn Maxwell follows Cummins in the list of expensice player, picked by Kings XI Punjab for a whopping Rs 10.75 crore.

The 13th edition cash-rich Twenty20 competition, due to begin on March 29 and pushed back to April 15, was postponed indefinitely in April due to the ongoing threats of the coronavirus pandemic. In the latest development, the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) is set to decide “course of action” soon. The next IPL auction will take place in 2021.

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