{"id":36789,"date":"2021-02-19T09:30:28","date_gmt":"2021-02-19T04:00:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/kashmir.today\/?p=36789"},"modified":"2021-02-19T09:30:28","modified_gmt":"2021-02-19T04:00:28","slug":"morris-becomes-most-expensive-ipl-buy-gowtham-goes-for-rs-9-25-cr-as-srk-makes-presence-felt","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/kashmir.watch\/?p=36789","title":{"rendered":"Morris becomes most expensive IPL buy; Gowtham goes for Rs 9.25 cr as \u2018SRK\u2019 makes presence felt"},"content":{"rendered":"

Chennai: <\/em><\/strong>Chris Morris on Friday became the most expensive buy in the IPL auction history with Rajasthan Royals shelling out Rs 16.25 crore for the South Africa all-rounder even as uncapped players such as Karnataka\u2019s K Gowtham also hogged the limelight with hefty deals here.<\/em><\/p>\n

Spin bowling All-rounder Gowtham was bought for a record Rs 9.25 crore by the Chennai Super Kings. The 32-year-old is currently with the Indian team as a net bowler for the ongoing Test series against England.<\/em><\/p>\n

Tamil Nadu\u2019s Shahrukh Khan, named after the Bollywood superstar, expectedly got a handsome Rs 5.25 crore deal from Punjab Kings, more than 51 times his base price of Rs 20 lakh. Shahrukh has been in the limelight with his exploits in the recent Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy.<\/em><\/p>\n

Gowtham, an IPL regular who was released by Punjab Kings, was the second off-spinner CSK bought after England\u2019s Moeen Ali. With the hefty price tag, Gowtham became the most expensive uncapped buy in IPL history. His base price was also Rs 20 lakh.<\/em><\/p>\n

Morris\u2019 big pay day came after another all-rounder and perennial under-performer, Australian Glenn Maxwell, once again managed to attract a winning Rs 14.25 crore bid from Royal Challengers Bangalore.<\/em><\/p>\n

Punjab Kings, who went into the auction with the maximum purse among eight teams, paid Rs 14 crore to rope in Australian pacer Jhye Richardson hoping he will plug the gap in their leaking bowling department.<\/em><\/p>\n

The 24-year-old, who has played two Tests, 13 ODIs and nine T20Is for Australia, was the leading wicket-taker in the recent Big Bash League.<\/em><\/p>\n

Punjab paid a big amount \u2014 Rs 8 crore \u2014 for another Australian pacer, the uncapped Riley Meredith. The 24-year-old has 43 wickets in 34 T20s that he has played.<\/em><\/p>\n

Morris, who came with a base price of Rs 75 lakh, generated bids from four teams before it became a battle between Royals and Punjab Kings.<\/em><\/p>\n

Royals eventually sealed it with a record bid which made Morris the costliest buy at the auction ever, surpassing Yuvraj Singh, who was bought by Delhi Capitals for Rs 16 crore in 2015.<\/em><\/p>\n

The costliest player in the IPL remains Virat Kohli, retained for Rs 17 crore by Royal Challengers Bangalore.<\/em><\/p>\n

In 70 IPL games, Morris has scored 551 runs at 23.95 and taken 80 wickets at 23.98.<\/em><\/p>\n

Talking about why Royals went all out on Morris, team COO Jake Luch McCrum said: \u201cWe actually spoke to Chris before the auction itself, and did a full medical review of him. He\u2019s in a bubble in South Africa now, about to play the domestic competition.<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cChris is an ex -Royal, and he\u2019s one of those players with experience and who can deal with a price tag like that. We\u2019ve re-balanced the side this year, he will fill in an important role for us.<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cHe is a quality bowler through all phases of the game, and also he can win us the game with the bat as well.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

Earlier, KKR made the opening bid for Maxwell but it eventually became a two-way war between Chennai Super Kings and RCB before the Virat Kohli-led team won him with a bid which came to USD 1.96 million.<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cWe wanted to get an X-factor player and we are delighted to get Maxwell,\u201d RCB Director of Cricket Mike Hesson said.<\/em><\/p>\n

Punjab Kings, who had paid Rs 10.75 crore for Maxwell in the previous auction, had released the 32-year-old following the 2020 edition in which he made 108 runs in 13 games at 15.42.<\/em><\/p>\n

In 82 IPL games, Maxwell has made 1505 runs at a modest average of 22.13.<\/em><\/p>\n

England all-rounder Moeen Ali also went for a high price of Rs 7 crore to Chennai Super Kings. Both Maxwell and Moeen had base prices of Rs 2 crore.<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cAbsolutely buzzing to play for CSK. They have a massive fan base and I can\u2019t wait to meet them. I can\u2019t wait to play under Dhoni. My teammate Sam Curran is there too. This made my day, made my year,\u201d said Moeen in a video message.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Chennai: Chris Morris on Friday became the most expensive buy in the IPL auction history with Rajasthan Royals shelling out Rs 16.25 crore for the South Africa all-rounder even as uncapped players such as Karnataka\u2019s K Gowtham also hogged the limelight with hefty deals here. Spin bowling All-rounder Gowtham was bought for a record Rs […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":36788,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-36789","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sport"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/kashmir.watch\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36789","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/kashmir.watch\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/kashmir.watch\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kashmir.watch\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kashmir.watch\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=36789"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/kashmir.watch\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36789\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kashmir.watch\/index.php?rest_route=\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/kashmir.watch\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=36789"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kashmir.watch\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=36789"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kashmir.watch\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=36789"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}