The Indian Premier League (IPL) is probably the richest cricket tournament in the world. Brand Finance, the renowned brand value consultancy pegs its value at $4.7 billion! Naturally, it attracts players from all the major cricket playing countries, and some of the lesser known ones too. Decades ago, the emoluments of India’s cricketers was really measly. They used to envy players from the so called ” developed” countries such as England, Australia, and New Zealand for their compensation. The wheel has turned full circle. In the last decade, players from these very countries hope for a lucrative IPL contact – these could change their fortunes!
This year’s auction was held recently at Bengaluru and 204 players including 67 from overseas were sold for Rs 551 crores. For the uninitiated -in India 1 crore is the equivalent of 10 million. Unlike the last few years, this year there were 10 franchisees bidding for the players with the addition of two new franchisees, the Lucknow Super Giants and the Gujarat Titans.
As if the fast paced action at the auction was not enough, there was a moment of apprehension when the widely respected auctioneer, Hugh Edmeade collapsed and had to receive immediate medical attention. Fortunately he not only responded well to the treatment but was back in action for the concluding part of the auction on the second day!
In Edmeade’s absence, the auctioning was done by Charu Sharma. Overall, he did a good job, I guess. However, I felt at times he was not consistent enough to be a good auctioneer. For some players/teams he was quite liberal with the time he gave for them to decide, for some others he wasn’t half so generous. I also felt he could have been a little more considerate for the young uncapped players. For them this is a make or break opportunity, so maybe a standard time could have been set. We saw some were declared unsold within seconds while others were given more time, which I thought was not fair.
Every IPL auction has its stars who draw the biggest bucks. This article lists the most expensive players over the years, starting from 2008. We have seen, though, that not all of them were very successful in that year. Possibly the sheer pressure of being the highest paid falls heavily on their shoulder. When people begin to calculate how much you cost per ball bowled/faced – you can imagine the pressure the player has to go through!
This year, young Ishan Kishen was the biggest gainer, being paid Rs 15.25 crores to be bought back by a team which did not retain him in the first place, the Mumbai Indians. Each team, as you know, were allowed to retain a maximum of four players, who then would not go into the auction. This brings me to an interesting observation. Should there be a minimum amount fixed for retained players? I ask because many who were not retained got far more by way of the auction. They were better off not being retained!!
The auction went off without a hitch, but there was a controversy when Charu Sharma declared Khaleel Ahmed sold to Delhi Capitals when really he should have gone to Mumbai Indians. He can perhaps be excused as there were so many players to be sold!
The players have made their contracts , now they must earn the big bucks spent on them on the cricket field!
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