IPL 4: Kolkata Knight Riders bag http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Gautam-Gambhir-c58623 for $2.4 million
The Indian Premier League auction started in Bangalore on Saturday with 353 players going under the hammer and a total of $90 million to be spent by the franchises.
The very glitzy and glamorous affair started early in the morning and until lunch, 25 players were sold to the franchises.
The first round began with nine ‘marquee’ players going under the hammer. Gautam Gambhir’s base price was $200,000 with http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Mumbai-c820 Indians going into the bid earlier than the other franchises.
However, Gautam Gambhir, who was not retained by his former employer http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Knight-c71599 Riders. The hammer banged for the first time in the morning
to tag the prolific Indian opener as sold. Gambhir crushed all the records as he led the auction play.
Tillakaratne Dilshan, the Sri Lankan all rounder was next to go under the radar with the base price of $400,000. However, after Gambhir’s magnanimous sale, he was sold for $650,000 to Royal Challengers Bangalore.
Zaheer Khan, who recently had a good run on the tour of http://www.senore.com/Cricket/South-Africa-c757, was also bagged up by Bangalore for $900,000.
Yusuf Pathan was the bidding’s biggest surprise as he was bagged up by the Kolkata Knight Riders for the second highest bid, $2.1 million.
He was closely followed by http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Robin-Uthappa-c2356 who also bagged up $2.1 million by Pune Warriors which is one of the two new additions to the franchise list this season.
Pune also bagged up Yuvraj Singh for $1.8 million after he was not retained by his former employers, the Kings XI Punjab.
Bollywood star Preity Zinta who is the co-owner of Kings XI Punjab, bagged up http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Punjab-c833 as he was sold for $1.4 million.
Another Bollywood star Shilpa Shetty’s franchise http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Rahul-c83321 Dravid for
a mere $500,000 and South African spin bowler http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Johan-Botha-c67173 for $950,000.
Deccan Chargers bagged England’s Kevin Pietersen, who recently had a good run in the Ashes series, for $650,000 along with Australia’s newly appointed Twenty20 captain Cameron White for $1.1 million. Sri Lanka’s World Cup 2011 captain Kumar Sangakkara was
also sold to Deccan for $700,000.
India’s veteran player Sourav Ganguly and West Indian greats Chris Gayle and Brian Lara remained unsold.
The fourth season of Indian Premier League is scheduled to run from 8 April 2011 to 20 May 2011.
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