5 Bold moves by franchise owners in IPL history

The Indian Premier League (IPL) is played on the cricket field and after every edition, the performances of the franchises are being analysed. Nearly two months of action keeps the audience at the edge of their seasons. However, the IPL is far more from only proceedings on the pitches.

The franchise owners also have to tear their hair apart and make some extremely bold decisions. Many of those moves are related to some of the biggest names doing the rounds in world cricket.

The tactics are like gambles, which have every chance of getting boomeranged. It would have taken a lot of guts from the teams to stick to their decisions in-spite of the odds against them. But, a few of them worked wonders and the franchises would be grateful to their decision-making move.

In the article, let’s take five bold decisions made by IPL franchises: –

1. KKR axing Sourav Ganguly

There were loads of expectations from Sourav Ganguly when he was picked to play for the Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR). But he didn’t find the going easy as the Men in Gold and Purple couldn’t make the top four even once during his stay with the team.

In 2010, he notched 493 runs with four half-centuries. But then Ganguly’s strike-rate of 117.66 didn’t help the team in the fielding restrictions. Reportedly, KKR wasn’t happy with Dada from the second season itself.

In 2011, after three indifferent seasons, the Knights decided to revamp their squad, roping in Gautam Gambhir as their skipper. Moreover, they also released Ganguly of his services and he moved to the Pune Warriors as Ashish Nehra’s replacement. After 2012, the elegant left-hander hung his boots from the IPL.