Pune breaks the bank for Ben, highest bid of 14.5 cr

Bengaluru: As expected England all rounder Ben Stokes came in for fierce bidding and Rising Pune Supergiants bagged him for a whopping Rs 14.5 crore in the IPL players auction held here today.A number of franchises were involved in stiff bidding moves with Mumbai Indians calling first against the base price of Rs 2 crore.

Then Delhi Daredevils, Sunrisers Hyderabad were involved in a duel before Pune made a late bid as the offer for the allrounder rose sharply and others could not match the final call at Rs 14.
5 crore.Speaking to reporters later, Pune outfit owner Sanjeev Goenka said Stokes was a complete player and the team was lacking the likes of the England allrounder.

On his availability for the entire season, Mr Goenka said the team know that he will be available only for the first 14 matches but those were the ones it was concentrating on.‘’It was a very conscious strategy to go for Stokes.New captain of Pune Steven Smith and coach Stephen Flemming were part of the collective decision,’’ he said.

The other player who went for a high price was another England player and fast bowler Tymal Mills.Royal Challengers Bangalore looking for a good fast bowler after the sudden withdrawal of Australian fast bowler Mitchell Starc which was announced only yesterday.RCB Chairman Amrut Thomas said the team was to rope in Mills after the withdrawal of Starc and in Bangalore conditions and small ground, the English cricketer suited the plan of things.
‘’He suits the playing conditions in the city.

We will be missing Starc but the decision was taken by both parties and was as planned.
It was best intent for everybody.Had we insisted on retaining him, it would have been difficult for Stark to take that much of load,’’ he added.

The other big players who came under the hammer England captain Eoin Morgan who went for his base price of Rs 2 crore to Knight’s XI Punjab, allrounder Angeo Mathews who was bagged by Delhi Daredevils for Rs 2 crore, another allounder Pawan Negi who was bought for Rs 1 crore against his base price of Rs 30 lakh by RCB and New Zealand all rounder Corey Andersen who was sold for Rs 1 crore to Delhi.

Karnataka allrounder K Gowtham also came in for fierce bidding was bought by Mumbai Indians for Rs 2 crore against the base price of just Rs 10 lakh.Prominent among those who were unsold were Ishant Sharma with a base price of Rs 2 crore, Martin Guptil (NZ), Jasen Roy, Alex Hales (both Eng), Ross Tayler (NZ), and Saurabh Tiwary, Chris Jordan (Eng) and Sean Abott (Aus).However, they will again come for second round of bidding later in the day.(UNI)