IPL 2024: Country-wise one big player who went unsold in the auction

In the 2024 Indian Premier League (IPL) auction, all ten franchises spent more than 230 crore. Mitchell Starc, Pat Cummins, Daryl Mitchell, and Harshal Patel made it to the list of most expensive players for the season. Cummins, who guided Australia to the 2023 World Cup trophy win, pulled off a contract of INR 20.50 crore from the 2016 champions Sunrisers Hyderabad (SRH) and broke the record of England’s Sam Curran, who was the costliest player in the history of the auctions.

Cummins couldn’t hold the title for an hour as his compatriot and teammate Starc was fetched for an enormous price of INR 24.75 crore by the KKR franchise. The 2021 Purple Cap winner Harshal Patel became the most expensive Indian player in the auction after getting sold to Punjab Kings (PBKS) for INR 11.75 crore.

On one side, some illustrious players broke into record books for fetching massive prices at the business extravaganza while some eminent names couldn’t attract bidders and went unsold. These players are renowned in international cricket and they were expected to get buyers. However, they didn’t fit into the scheme of things of the franchises. Talking more about them, let’s know one extraordinary player from every country who went unsold.

Here is one distinguished name from each nation that failed to attract bidders in the 2024 IPL auction

7. Sri Lanka - Kusal Mendis

Sri Lanka’s Kusal Mendis was announced in the first round of the auction with a base amount of INR 50 lakh. He went unsold as all franchises refused to raise their bidding paddles. Mendis’ ordinary T20 International (T20I) numbers might have gone against him. Playing 55 T20Is in Sri Lanka colours, he has scored only 1270 runs at a strike rate of 133.68.

Talking about his recent batting performances, the right-handed batter looked confident with his bat for Bangla Tiger in the 2023-24 Abu Dhabi T10 League. Playing seven games, he racked up 116 runs in seven games at a strike rate of 196.61. However, his impressive numbers couldn’t convince the franchises to invest in him.