CHENNAI: As the hammer went down one final time in Bengaluru on Sunday, there was a round of applause among the franchises.
After two hectic days, which saw plenty of stressful faces across the auction room, there isn’t a single team that would say they are fully satisfied with their picks.
From the franchises’ point of view, there is simply no perfect auction, because beyond a point, the affordability of a player is not in their total control.
Instead, what they attempt is to at least get their second or even third choice player, and ensure there are no holes.
Over the weekend, 10 teams had arrived in Bengaluru, having done their homework, and permutations only to see those sitting in the other nine tables outsmart them with a different approach and outlook.
The question ahead of this player auction was how the teams with two more new entrants in Lucknow Super Giants and Gujarat Titans will manage to put together a balanced squad. The balance is a key thing in the IPL.
It is what most teams struggle to crack, especially when it comes to their overseas picks and the Indian players.
The USP of the IPL, especially over the last four-five seasons, has been its unpredictability and its nature of the event going down to the wire. The gap among the teams has only been getting narrower and narrower.
Holes to fill
So at the end of two days, what we have now is the sort of squad imbalance many franchises feared would be the case prior to the auction.
Mumbai Indians and Chennai Super Kings, two teams who usually have a plan in mind and hardly deviate from it, continued with it. The nine titles they share between them is a testament to their policy of sticking to their philosophy.
They tried to stick it as much as possible this time too, but they would be far from happy as they have holes to fill. To cut the story short, they have at least a couple of weak links which will be hard to ignore when it comes down to the final XI.
Mumbai, even dared to do something totally brave, by going for Jofra Archer who won’t be available for this season. That they went as high as Rs 8 crore said, they were not just looking at the coming season, but one after that. Similarly, they spent Rs 8.2 crore on Tim David, a T20 freelancer from Singapore, whose reputation is only on the ascendance.
Almost there
These two giants aside, the rest, too, showed how far they have travelled in terms of acing the auction. Delhi Capitals, Punjab Kings, Rajasthan Royals have managed to get the sort of balance they hoped for.
Punjab and Delhi, especially have a good mix of aggressive batters and able bowlers with which they can definitely dream of a play-off berth.
“There is absolutely more demand than supply, but I guess there were challenges because there were 10 teams and it was different. I have been in couple of big mega auctions in 2011, 2014 and smaller auctions before this auction. This one has been really, really different and more challenging because every player, that whoever is going for, is going for a large sum of money, so the purse is dwindling no matter what value you have in your purse. The auction dynamics are very very different and you have to be nimble and that is something we realised in the last one and half days. You have to be even more nimble during this auction then the previous ones,” Punjab head coach and director of operations, Anil Kumble said.
Issues remain
Sunrisers Hyderabad, who like Punjab preferred a new-look side, have addressed their middle-order issues and have a strong base in place.
As has been the case, they are slightly loaded in favour of bowlers, but again, it is a philosophy they have stuck to all the while.
Royal Challengers Bangalore, too, have a squad which they will be happy with, but like Mumbai and Chennai have holes they have to manage with.
Kolkata Knight Riders, as usual have been different and creative with their picks, but just like the last couple of seasons, they arguably have the least threatening top-order.
Off to good start
In their first attempt, Lucknow and Ahmedabad have managed to assemble not just a good squad, but also have a ready XI in place.
Lucknow, especially, have managed to get their hands on as many multi-dimensional players as possible.
Gujarat have gone in for a fully youthful squad and added Wriddhiman Saha only at the end to cover all their bases.