MIL/Agencies/Reuters, Feb 20, 2008. Author: IR Summary
Mumbai, India: February 20,2008 – IR Summary - Mahendra Singh Dhoni of India and Andrew Symonds of Australia have topped the bidding. Dhoni is preferred being India’s one day Captain and Symonds is considered being all rounder. Virender Sehwag was moved up to the 'designated city player' category.In all 75 players were sold.
Chennai came out $1.5 million (773,700 pounds) for Mahendra Singh Dhoni while Hyderabad paid $1.35m for Symonds at a showy auction to decide who and where to play in the 44-day IPL tournament starting from April 18 and will feature 59 matches.
The bid was astounding and unexpectedly exciting. Inderjit Bindra, a member of the IPL governing council, told reporters. "The market is determining the price. That's how a free market economy should flow."
Dhoni was snapped up by Chennai in the first round of the sale.
Retired Australian leg-spinner Shane Warne was the first player to go under the hammer in a five-star Mumbai hotel conference room filled with cricketers, celebrities and tycoons, fetching $450,000 from Jaipur as per Reuters.
The team will pay the winning bid to the player annually. The contracts are for a three-year period and are guaranteed by the Indian cricket board.
Indian paceman Ishant Sharma was bought by Kolkata for $950,000 and his partner Rudra Pratap Singh fetched $875,000 and was bought by Hyderabad.
Warne's compatriot fast bowler Brett Lee was snapped up by Mohali for $900,000 while Australia captain Ricky Ponting was bought by Kolkata for $400,000.
The Mumbai franchise, which has Sachin Tendulkar as the designated city player and is owned by India's richest company Reliance Industries, paid $975,000 for Sri Lankan Sanath Jayasuriya and $850,000 for India spinner Harbhajan Singh.
With the designated city players to get 15 per cent more than the highest paid player in their teams, Tendulkar, Saurav Ganguly of Kolkata, Rahul Dravid of Bangalore and Yuvraj Singh of Mohali also cross the $1 million mark per annum earnings.
The eight franchise teams of the IPL -- Bangalore, Chennai, Delhi, Hyderabad, Jaipur, Kolkata, Mohali and Mumbai -- had a budget of up to $5 million each to purchase contracted players. The maximum number of overseas signings was capped at eight per team.
