India premier off-spinner Ravichandran Ashwin has weighed in his thoughts on the upcoming mega auction as he believes that Faf du Plessis will be one of the hot picks in the auction. Last season Faf du Plessis fell short of the ‘Orange Cup’ award with just 2 runs as he scored 633 runs with an average of 45.21 and a strike rate of 138.20 which included 6 fifties.
Ashwin, who is producing lots of content for his Youtube Channel, expressed his thoughts on the auction strategy for his former franchise Chennai Super Kings. He warned them that there would be a bidding war for the Protea batter. In the 2018 Mega auction, CSK used an RTM (Right to match) card to get him in 1.6 Crores.
Faf du Plessis scored 633 runs in the IPL 2022
“Last time around, CSK stole Faf du Plessis for 1.5 crore. But this time, I don’t see that type of steal happening for him. CSK fans will definitely have him on their wish list. If CSK wants to buy Faf du Plessis this time, they should definitely be ready to spend a lot more than they did last time.
“Faf du Plessis will have a great demand in my opinion. Faf will be sought after by most teams,” Ashwin spoke on his youtube channel.
Ahead of the auction, CSK retained 4 players- Ravindra Jadeja, MS Dhoni, Ruturaj Gaikwad, and Moeen Ali and they will go with 48 Crores left in their purse for the auction.
When Ashwin was asked if he’s willing to go to his former franchise, he expressed his positive interest however he is not too sure if the franchise would like to go with another off-spinner as they already have Moeen Ali.
“I’m actually not too sure, but to be honest, a professional player going anywhere giving his best must be the ideal way to go about it, But yeah, I am 35 now, it will be nice to come back to where I started but they already have an off-spinner with them in Moeen Ali. So I don’t know how they gonna go about it, so let’s wait and watch,” he said.
The mega auction will be held on February 12 and 13 at 11 AM in Bengaluru.