IPL 2018 auction: Ravi Ashwin a 'tad disappointed' at being ignored by CSK

Ravichandran Ashwin played for the Chennai Super Kings from 2008 until 2015

What's the story?

India's premier off-spinner Ravichandran Ashwin has confessed that he felt unhappy after not being retained or picked up by the Chennai Super Kings in the 2018 IPL auction last month.

"I was a tad disappointed because I have been here for the last ten years," Ashwin said of his absence from the CSK outfit after years of representing them in the tournament.

In case you didn't know...

Ever since the tall off-spinner was picked by the Chennai Super Kings in the first IPL auction in 2008, he played for them in every season until 2015. It was when CSK and the Rajasthan Royals were suspended for two years in 2016 and 2017 that he had to move over to the new side Rising Pune Supergiant.

But in the auctions for the eleventh edition in 2018, it was the Kings XI Punjab who opted for Ashwin for a sum of INR 7.6 crore.

The heart of the matter

The 31-year-old made his feelings known about the prospect of Chennai now being an away ground for him and the CSK becoming his opponents.

"Literally, I have owned that space around Chepauk. Every time I came on to bowl, the kind of roaring and cheering I got will always stick on to my head. Coming back there, to play against CSK, will probably motivate me more,” he made clear.

What's next?

Ashwin is currently a part of the Tamil Nadu team playing in the Vijay Hazare Trophy, India's domestic fifty-over competition. And with him and Ravindra Jadeja not in the limited-overs scheme of things for India currently, it is possible that his next tournament will be the IPL itself which begins on April 7.

Author's Take

For someone who was a part of the same team for eight seasons in a row, it was, but natural for Ashwin to have felt disheartened at realising that he would now have to play for a new franchise.