New Delhi:
There is a saying that Old is Gold. One player showed that he is worth his weight in gold after being snubbed for a couple of years in the IPL. Pravin Tambe, at 48 years of age, became the oldest player in the history of the IPL Auction to be brought by a team. Tambe, who had played for Rajasthan Royals and Gujarat Lions, was taken by Kolkata Knight Riders for his base price of Rs 20 lakh and once he was taken, the auction hall burst into applause. Tambe made his IPL debut at the age of 41 and he became the oldest IPL player in history when Rajasthan Royals took on Delhi Daredevils at Jaipur in May 2013.
Tambe shot into prominence when he became the first bowler to take 10 wickets in four matches in the Champions League T20 and is the first and only bowler to bowl 15 overs without conceding a six. He enjoyed a brilliant year in 2014 when he took 15 wickets in 13 games, including a haul of 4/20. After his last stint with Sunrisers Hyderabad, Tambe was not picked in the next three editions. The turnaround in fortunes could not have been starker for Tambe as he left several youngsters in the shade.
If Tambe was the oldest in the auction, then this event also featured a 14-year-old spinner from Afghanistan in Noor Ahmed. However, Ahmed was unpicked. The remaining youngsters, most of them uncapped players, did not get a chance to do well in the auction. Yashasvi Jaiswal was keenly watching the IPL auction on the mobile feed of Hotstar. The youngster had already made a big mark when he put up a solid display in the Vijay Hazare and Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy.
Before the IPL 2020 player auction, there were reports that the Under-19 players would be rewarded for their display and in Kolkata, they were. Jaiswal was taken for Rs 2.4 crore by Rajasthan Royals while Priyam Garg, who is the captain of the Under-19 team heading for the World Cup in South Africa, was taken for Rs 1.9 crore by Sunrisers Hyderabad. The most expensive Indian in the auction proved to be another veteran in Piyush Chawla, who was taken for Rs 6.5 crore by Chennai Super Kings. Varun Chakravarthy was the next with Rs 4 crore while the most expensive buy of the day was Pat Cummins who was taken by Kolkata Knight Riders for Rs 15.5 crore, which made him the most expensive foreign buy in the history of the tournament.
