England duo Stokes, Mills earn big in IPL auction

Mills, meanwhile, benefited from Mitchell Starc’s late withdrawal from the tournament as he was snapped up by Royal Challengers Bangalore – the team the Australia paceman had been due to represent – for 12 crore (£1.4m), more than 20 times his base price.

The 27-year-old Rajasthan seam bowler was purchased by RCB from a base price of 10 lakh, adding to the squad’s increased pace stocks. But then, Hyderabad increased the bid to Rs 11 crore and later Delhi at Rs 11.5 crore. While there was no doubt about Rabada going big, Delhi also paid a whopping Rs 4.5 crore for Australian Pat Cummins. Here are some of the highlights of the Auction. Sunrisers buys him for Rs. 30 lakh. He had earlier played for Kings XI Punjab. RCB now have Rs 17.825 crore (USD 2,660,447 approx.) to spend at the auction. But hold on, as Delhi Daredevils make a late entry just as the hammer was about to go down.

At his base price and his erratic bowling in the format, Ishant is a tricky pick. While playing for Pune and Delhi, the all-rounder had been auctioned for more than Rs 5 crore.

Tanmay Agarwal is sold to Sunrisers Hyderabad for Rs 10 lakhs. It was Supergiants’ maiden IPL campaign, and for the first time Dhoni had failed in getting his side to the playoffs. Pawan Negi was bought by RCB for Rs 1 crore.

All-rounder Mohammad Nabi became the first Afghanistan player to be picked in the auction.

New Zealand’s Martin Guptill, India’s Faiz Fazal, England’s Alex Hales, New Zealand’s Ross Taylor, India’s Saurabh Tiwary, Irfan Pathan, South Africa’s Sean Abbott and England’s Chris Jordan went unsold.

Even as the eight franchises are busy deciding on their final plans and strategies going into the Indian Premier League auction in Bengaluru on Monday, chairman Rajeev Shukla is set to miss the event as he is busy with election duty in Uttar Pradesh. Things are gonna get heated up at the auction as teams will definitely try to get the services of this package.

Australia’s captain Steve Smith, who was yesterday named skipper of Rising Pune Supergiants, takes a breather during Day One of the warm-up tie vs India “A” at the CCI on Friday.

Having led the now-suspended Chennai Super Kings to two titles, four runners-up, one semifinalist and one play-off finishes, Dhoni averted the embarrassment of a last-place finish for RPS previous year.