How CSK was helped in the 'fixed' IPL Auction

This is in continuance with the post I had written yesterday: Was IPL Auction Fixed?

In the last post, I had raised the points like why previous Chennai Super Kings players were put up on the auction floor late in the day, why CSK was mostly silent in the first few hours of the auction (which helped them to save money) and suddenly became hyper-active in the later half of the day (when the saved money by not buying players in the first half was used). If a team is not certain when would some certain players come in the auction list, it will certainly try to be safe by going for at least some players initially till its favored players’ turn come. CSK did nothing like that. Did they know when a particular player’s name would turn up? Such questions wouldn’t have been asked if the group of players who were auctioned had been picked randomly which was actually the rule till ‘mysteriously’ it was changed just few hours before the start of the auction.

I decided to dig deep. It is really impossible for me to find out if CSK did bid for any player initially and if yes what was their maximum bid (can be checked if the auction videos are available), but luckily I could find out the order in which the names of the players came to the auction and who bought them for what price. I will describe the timeline of events that happened in the auction room with the focus on CSK’s buying. I have the data only for the Day one of the auction (January 8) but not for the day 2. I don’t think that will affect much as the best deals were made in the Day-1. The CSK players playing for CSK in IPL1, 2, 3 are mentioned as ex-CSK in the rest part of the post. So here is the timeline:

*AUCTION STARTED with Gautam Gambhir’s name. The first group of players to be auctioned were the ‘Marquee Players’ or the players with big names. Being the big names, it was expected that all teams’ eyes would be on this group.

*Chennai remained silent. Till the lunch break in total 27 players’ name came. Expectedly heavy bidding was made. Yet, CSK didn’t make a single buy. Out of the 27, 25 were sold and not a single one to CSK. Out of the 25 sold players, 3 went to KKR, 4 to RCB, 3 to RR, 3 to DC, 5 to Kochi, 3 to Pune, 2 to MI, 1 to KXIP and 1 to DD. Every other team bought at least one player till the lunch, but not the CSK. Did they know when would ‘their’ players’ turn come? [KKR: Kolkata Knight Riders, RCB: Royal Bangalore Challengers, RR: Rajasthan Royals, DC: Deccan Chargers, MI: Mumbai Indians, KXIP: Kings XI Punjab, DD: Delhi Daredevils]

*Among these 27 names only no name belonged to the CSK in the previous seasons.

*After the lunch break, Auction restarted at 2.30 PM. As per the change in rule (which MI has complained) the batsmen category came up for the auction as ‘pre-planned’. The third name which came was that of Mike Hussey (ex-CSK) and CSK lapped him up for $425,000.

*From this point CSK suddenly became active on the auction floor. It made two buys in between: W Saha and D Bravo (non-CSK) for small price. At 4 pm when Tea Break was announced only 1 ex-CSK names had come up in the auction. CSK had bought him with total 3 players bought when the auction had already seen 57 players being auctioned.

*When the auction restarted at 4.30 pm, a hyper-active CSK was noticed while all other teams were inactive due to low balance in their purse. Before 6pm when the auction ended, the ex-CSK names that came up were (if CSK bought them and for what price mentioned in the bracket): D Bollinger(Bought for $700,000), M Muralidharan (Not bought), R Ashwin (Bought for $850,000). The source I referred for this list couldn’t provide the info when S Badrinath(wx-CSK) was auctioned whom also CSK virtually retained earler in the day.

*Though I haven’t the order in which the players appeared on day 2. Still every player appearing on Day 2 means they appeared late in the auction list and that was due to the ‘much talked’ last moment rule change. Even more ex-CSK players appeared on auction table on Day 2 and CSK bought them up. The names are: Sudeep Tyagi, Joginder Sharma. So at the end of the auction CSK had retained 7 of their previous team in the auction and 4 more using the player retaition clause.

All these could have been coincidences had there been no change in rules as reported. Had it been all random, all these questions wouldn’t have arisen. The events supports the speculation that the current BCCI Secretary who happens to be the owner of CSK team had indeed twisted laws to help the Chennai in the auction. Now, he has to come up with some credible answer if he is really not guilty of ‘conflict of interest’.

The source I used for the data used in this post: IPL Auction: Live Blogging. I’m sure about it’s authenticity as I was following it during the IPL auction itself along with the TV on. Do you believe Srinivasan fixed the IPL auction in favor of CSK?