New Zealand pace spearhead Trent Boult has expressed his excitement after being signed by Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) for the upcoming season of the Indian Premier League.
The left-arm pacer, who had walked into last year’s IPL with a big reputation, could play only one game for his franchise Sunrisers Hyderabad. In Mustafizur Rahman, the Hyderabad-based outfit had found a brilliant T20 bowler and so they found it tough to accommodate Boult in their line-up. But the Kiwi pacer is likely to feature heavily for his new team this term.
KKR have already lost one of their pace-bowling options in the form of Andre Russell, who is serving a one-year ban for violating the World Anti-Doping Agency’s (WADA) whereabouts clause.
“Different teams need different things. It was frustrating to only play one game last year but that’s the way the tournament is played – four overseas players [in the XI] so people have to miss out. I’m definitely looking forward to putting my foot forward for KKR,” Boult said on Tuesday (February 21).
“Building up to [2015] World Cup I wouldn’t have put myself in the bracket of top five or six white-ball bowlers in the country. But my game has grown, I’m a lot more confident with the white ball and now things like this are knocking at the door.”
KKR paid a whooping Rs 5 crore for securing the services of Boult. The bowler is now only behind Brendon McCullum, former Kiwi captain, who takes away Rs 7.5 crores for playing for Gujarat Lions.
“We were in a car with a couple of the lads following the Twitter feed. To see the name come through with a figure like that next to it was pretty unbelievable. It’s bizarre how that much money can be put on the head of a player to play six or seven weeks,” he said.
Boult further said playing in front of a huge crowd is more attractive than the huge money.
“I’m not going for the money,” he said.
“The experience of playing there in front of thousands of people is the most exciting part. I’m looking forward to rubbing shoulders with a few more international players and growing my game,” he concluded.