"Where did you think he will bat when you acquired him?" - Aakash Chopra questions Sunrisers Hyderabad's planning while buying Harry Brook

Aakash Chopra has questioned Sunrisers Hyderabad's thought process while buying Harry Brook at the IPL 2023 auction.

SRH bought Brook for a whopping ₹13.25 crore. The England big-hitter, though, endured a poor run in the recently concluded edition of the Indian Premier League. He aggregated just 190 runs in 11 innings despite scoring an unbeaten century against Kolkata Knight Riders.

In a video shared on his YouTube channel, Chopra reflected on some of the big-ticket acquisitions and their performances in IPL 2023. Regarding Brook, he said:

"Harry Brook was bought for around 13.5 crores. Where did you think he will bat when you acquired him? You should have thought that he will bat at the top of the order because his numbers against spin are extremely ordinary, and he would have to play a lot of spin in the middle overs in India."

The former Indian opener pointed out that Sunrisers Hyderabad were forced to play the England batter in the lower middle order at the start of the tournament:

"So you had to try to bat him up the order but you couldn't do that. You started with batting him down the order because you picked Mayank Agarwal, already had Abhishek Sharma, Rahul Tripathi is also a top-order batter, and Aiden Markram cannot play below No. 4."

Chopra highlighted that Brook was again demoted after a few failures as an opener despite scoring a century at the position. He added that although SRH bought a good player, the spot at which he could have been best utilised wasn't always available.

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"I liked Nicholas Pooran's purchase" - Aakash Chopra

Nicholas Pooran played a few belligerent knocks for Lucknow Super Giants. (P/C: iplt20.com)

On the flip side, Aakash Chopra praised Lucknow Super Giants for their thought process while acquiring Nicholas Pooran:

"I liked Nicholas Pooran's purchase in this scenario because Nicholas Pooran was picked with the sole thinking that he will bat at the death. He was bought for 16 crores, was very expensive, but there was a clarity of thought."

The reputed commentator also lauded the West Indies wicketkeeper-batter for performing the assigned role to perfection:

"They didn't want to play him at No. 3, 4 or 5 but at the death. He is also that kind of a player who can play there. They gave him one role, and, in my opinion, he performed that extremely well."

Pooran smashed 358 runs at an outstanding strike rate of 172.94 in 15 innings in IPL 2023. The left-hander even smoked a match-winning 15-ball half-century in LSG's away game against Royal Challengers Bangalore.