SRH vs RCB: Mike Hesson blames this Sri Lankan player for not picking Yuzvendra Chahal in IPL auction

Former Royal Challengers Bengaluru (RCB) Director of Cricket, Mike Hession, has finally revealed the thought process and strategy behind releasing and then not being able to buy the leg-spinner Yuzvendra Chahal at the IPL auction in 2022.

Hesson expressed his disappointment at not retaining and bidding for Chahal during the IPL auction. The former RCB team director further mentioned that Chahal is a highly skilled bowler, and losing him was frustrating.

He also revealed that the decision not to retain Chahal was based on the team's strategy to retain three players, which would provide them with additional funds for the auction.

RCB wanted to buy Yuzvendra Chahal at the IPL 2022 auction

Despite this, Hesson said that the RCB wanted to bid for Chahal at the mega IPL 2022 auction, but the team's plans were disrupted when his auction number came up very far, and they could not bid for him as they signed Wanindu Hasaranga. So, RCB didn’t need another spin option on the team.

However, the talented and experienced leg-spinner was then bought by the Rajasthan Royals (RR) for INR 6.5 crore, and it turned out to be a game changer for the franchise as Chahal emerged as the Purple Cap winner with 27 scalps in 17 games, and they made it to the final, losing the title to the Gujarat Titans (GT).

The Rajasthan Royals (RR) retained Chahal for the 2023 and 2024 seasons as well. Last year, Chahal finished as the fifth-highest wicket-taker in the IPL 2023 with 21 wickets from 14 games. In the ongoing IPL 2024 as well, the star leg-spinner is shining bright, as he is in the race for the Purple Cap, having already taken 13 wickets from 8 games for Rajasthan so far.

I'll be frustrated until I finish my career: Mike Hesson

Meanwhile, during a discussion on Jio Cinema, former Indian cricketer Robin Uthappa asked Hesson about the franchise's thought processes in letting go of such high-quality and match-winning spinner Chahal, and the former coach said that they were just unfortunate not to be able to bid for him.

Mike Hesson said on the Jio Cinema, “Yeah, well I mean Yuzi's one that I'll be frustrated with until I finish my career and probably beyond. He's an outstanding bowler and I guess when you come to every cycle, you've got to decide in terms of who you're going to retain and it was one of those things, where if you only retain three players, you give yourself an extra four crore in the auction and that potentially gave us the chance to get both Harshal and Yuzi.

And then the order of the auction came up and Yuzvendra Chahal was at number 65. I think in the auction and you know because we'd retained that many players, we were going to get bullied. So, after Yuzi, there were no other spinners we were interested in. We were obviously interested in Hasaranga as another option. We didn't get Yuzi, so we bid for him up front, and then once we got Hasaranga, obviously that meant that we couldn't go for Yuzi later on.”

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