IPL 2011: Intelligent Business

IPL auction: Insight (day 2)

Boredom and surprise mark second day; no bids for over 100 players

The two-day IPL auction ended today with the little known Australian all-rounder Daniel Christian going for the highest price of $900,000 with Deccan Chargers bagging him by paying 18 times his base price.

While there was nothing remotely catholic about Saturday's bidding with franchises fighting it out furiously, today's proceedings were subdued as team owners had just about $19.5 million to splurge around.

The mood was so sombre that nobody bid for over a hundred players. But, like a Bollywood script that is boring in the first half but still delivers kicks towards the end, the IPL auction saw some end-game excitement that saw Mohammed Kaif being auctioned for a third time.

The big surprise on Day Two was that in spite of two rounds of re-auction, critics' favourite Saurav Ganguly's name did not come up. During the first round of re-auction, 28 players came up for rebidding but only 12 were picked up and for the second round, even out of this 12, eight saw no bidding – that is, they were snapped up at the base price.

Only one player, Mohammed Kaif, was put up for a third time at Pune's request and since none of the other franchises objected, ‘the re-re-auction', as the auctioneer put it, was permitted. Surprisingly, though Pune and Deccan Chargers bid for Kaif, he was finally bagged by Royal Challengers, Bangalore (RCB) for $130,000, 30 per cent more than his base price.

Thanks to this purchase, RCB's purse runs very low on funds, a point noted by franchise owner Mr Vijay Mallya at a press conference shortly after the bidding ended.

Now, RCB has just $360,000 left of the original $9 million cap for all teams.

Players who didn't make it include Sanath Jayasuria, Brian Lara and Chris Gayle, clearly showing that most foreign players had been discounted. The bids for uncapped players will open on Monday with a salary cap of Rs 32 lakh.

Youngsters preferred

There also seemed to be a strong preference for youngsters, a point made by Mr Mallya when asked why his team didn't bid for Rahul Dravid. He said that while he had every respect for this cricketer, RCB was committed to building a young team.

There was some drama while bidding for the under-rated Indian team medium pacer Vinay Kumar who finally went to Team Kochi for $475,000 which was nearly four times his base price. Royal Challengers made a valiant bid but couldn't retain him, something the franchisee's owner, Mr Mallya regretted later.

Mumbai Indians, which lost Zaheer Khan to RCB, managed to get Munaf Patel on its side for $700,000.

Pacer Umesh Yadav was bid for furiously and Delhi Daredevils were able to buy him for $750,000 though his base price was a low $50,000.

IPL 2011: Intelligent Business

IPL-4 auction: Insight

Gautam Gambhir opens IPL-4 auction scoring $2.4 million:

72 players go for $52.8 m; India is flavour; Sourav Ganguly, Brian Lara unsold.

It was `Be Indian, Buy Indian', as former cricketer Navjot Singh Siddhu described, on the first day of the Indian Premier League-4 (IPL) auction on Saturday.

Of the top 10 players who got the highest bids, six were Indians and collectively they went for a total of $13.9 million, with the Indian opener, Gautam Gambhir, picked up by Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) for a whopping $2.4 million - the highest bid of the day.

Each team can spend a maximum of $9 million for buying the players for a period of two years.

The auctions were held at ITC Gardenia Hotel that also hosts cricket teams during matches in Bangalore. The auction began with a draw of lots and the first player to be bid for was Gambhir. Midway through the process, Mumbai Indians, represented by Nita Ambani, wife of Mr Mukesh Ambani, dropped out of the race after hitting $800,000. KKR team, whose owner, actor Shah Rukh Khan, was not present, continued bidding for the player and finally won him for $2.4 million.

Yusuf Pathan's name came soon after and he went for the next highest bid of $2.1 million, again bagged by KKR in the auction which described as "a combination of poker and snakes and ladder." The fight to get Robin Uthappa was intense with his home team, Royal Challengers, Bangalore (RCB), and Delhi Daredevils battling it out. But the player was eventually bagged by a rank outsider, Team Pune, of the Sahara Group, for $2.1 million.

Incidentally, Uthappa is not even in the national T-20 team.

MIDWAY SHOCKS

But the shocks were to come midway through the auction with former Indian captain Saurav Ganguly and Brian Lara were among the 16 players unsold.

Rahul Dravid, too, went for a low $500,000 bagged by Rajasthan Royals. Surprisingly, RCB chose not to bid for him at all and later the team's co-owner, Mr Siddharth Mallya, told that they decided not to do so because Dravid was "not a T-20 player."

HIGH DRAMA

It was high drama during the bidding process when Mr Vijay Mallya's son, Siddharth, who went up to the table of Kings XI Punjab (KP) owner, actor Preity Zinta, and objected to her protests over a certain bid that went in favour of RCB.

In the end, as some of the commentators pointed out, the Day 1 honours belonged to KKR, which bagged Yusuf Pathan, Gautam Gambhir and Jacuqes Kallis, followed by RCB that got Indian medium pacer Zaheer Khan for $900,000, Tillkaratne Dilshan ($650,000) and Daniel Vettori ($550,000). Mumbai Indians, "strong as an oak tree", got Andrew Symonds and Rohit Sharma.

It had retained Sachin Tendulkar in the team. Chennai SuperKings, captained by Indian captain M. S. Dhoni, was subdued for most part of the day, as it has already certain key players in its team.

Towards the end of the day, it however, swung into action and bagged Mr Cricket, Mike Hussey, for $425,000, and after a major battle with the others, got S. Badrinath for $800,000.

Listed firms tighten purse strings on Day 1

Ambanis and Mallyas spend the most.

Listed companies who own teams in the Indian Premier League chose to be cautious with their spending on the first day of the player auctions.

GMR-owned Delhi Daredevils and Deccan Chronicle Holdings Ltd's Deccan Chargers were two of the lowest spenders on day one. Deccan Chargers spent $5.5 million (Rs 24.93 crore) while Delhi Daredevils spent $5.84 million (Rs 26.5 crore) in a relatively quiet day for the two at the auctions.

India Cements-backed Chennai Super Kings, who are also the reigning IPL champions, started off the day on a quiet note but a string of strategic purchases towards the end of the day took Chennai's total spending up to $7.62 (Rs 34.57 crore).

Low spenders

“The low spenders of the day were the teams owned by companies who are answerable to their shareholders. It would not be right to expect them to be shelling out a large amount of money for one single player. Overall these three teams made some good strategic buys,” 

Big spenders

The big spenders of the day included the likes of Kolkata Knight Riders, Royal Challengers Bangalore, Mumbai Indians, Kochi and Pune.

The UB Group which recently consolidated its sports ventures in a separate subsidiary were the biggest spenders of the day with Royal Challengers Bangalore spending $7.9 million (Rs 35.81 crore). Mumbai Indians' owner and Mukesh Ambani's wife, Ms Nita Ambani, flexed the financial muscle as Mumbai Indians spent more than $6 million in the first half of the auction itself. At the end of the day, Mumbai Indians had done $7.64 (Rs 34.6 crore) worth of shopping.

Kolkata Knight Riders, owned by Knight Riders Sports Pvt Ltd, made the two costliest buys of the day. Gautam Gambhir was bought by the team for $2.4 million (Rs 11.04 crore) while a further $2.1 million (Rs 9.52 crore) was spent for acquiring Yusuf Pathan.

Finally
The total money that the 10 IPL teams including new entrants, Team Kochi and Sahara Pune Warriors, spent on Day 1 was $52.8 million for buying 72 of the 353 players under hammer (The auction continues tomorrow).