Adil Rashid, the England leg spinner wasn’t surprised to miss out on a lucrative Indian Premier League (IPL) 2021 contract last month in the auction held at Chennai on 18th February as he wasn’t expecting to get picked by any of the 8 franchises, considering the large pool of spinners India itself has. Adil Rashid had a base price of Rs 1.5 crore and went unsold in the IPL auction last month. The spinner, however, is not disappointed by the exclusion.
Adil Rashid Wasn’t Expecting Himself To Get Picked In IPL 2021 For Availability Of Lot Of Spinners
57 players were bought and a total of Rs 145.3 crore was spent at the mini-auction for IPL 2021. 22 overseas players were sold. Adil Rashid was unsold though joining the likes of Jason Roy, Aaron Finch, Alex Hales, Alex Carey, Sandeep Lamichhane, Marnus Labuschagne, Naveen Ul Haq, Thisara Perera, Devon Conway, and Shaun Marsh.
Former England skipper Michael Vaughan was impressed with his performance as well. After seeing the exploits of Adil Rashid with the ball in the shortest format of the game, he expressed surprise that the former doesn’t play in the Indian Premier League (IPL). The leg-spinner has applied for IPL auctions innumerable times in the past, but till now, no franchise has shown any interest in bidding for the England star.
“I wouldn’t say disappointing (on him being not picked in IPL auction). Obviously, there are a lot of spinners out there and India also got their own local spinners. So I wasn’t really expecting myself to get picked because I knew there are a lot of spinners out there. So not too disappointing in that sense,” said Rashid in a virtual press conference on Saturday.
Adil Rashid took the prized scalp of India skipper Virat Kohli in the first T20I on Friday after opening the bowling for England. Though he had previously bowled a first over, the spinner admitted it was something new for him.
“Hope I can carry on with that regardless of the situation, whether it’s first six (overs), middle or back, I am always looking to develop and work hard,” he added.
Spinner Adil Rashid, bowling with a new ball, dismissed Virat Kohli after Chris Jordan took a good catch at mid-off. Jofra Archer was one of England’s many star performers in the match and did not concede a run from 16 of his 24 deliveries and got the wickets of KL Rahul, Hardik Pandya, and Shardul Thakur along the way. He returned with figures of 3/23 and was awarded Man of the Match.
Adil Rashid Focusing On White Ball Limited Overs Cricket
Having last played a match in the longest format of the game prior to the 2019 World Cup, the leg-spinner said playing Test cricket hasn’t crossed his mind as he is focusing on the white-ball format.
“Test cricket or Ashes has not really crossed my mind. There is a World Cup coming and there is a lot of cricket before that, let’s see all goes. I am focussing on white-ball cricket at the moment,” Rashid concluded.
Adil Rashid has played 19 Tests, 105 ODIs, and 53 T20Is and he has picked 60,155 and 52 wickets respectively in the 3 formats. He debuted in the limited-overs format in 2009. He played Tests from 2015 to 2019 as his last Test came against West Indies in January 2019.
The Eoin Morgan-led side, which won the first T20I comfortably by eight wickets after a commendable performance by England bowlers, will now look to extend their lead in the ongoing five-match series when they face India in the second T20I at the same venue on Sunday.