JAIPUR: The Rajasthan Royals felt the pinch when their limited purse of 13.20 crore did not allow them to spend freely on their first choice player Harry Brook. He was finally taken by Sunrisers Hyderabad for a whopping 13.25 crore, more than the entire budget the Royals possessed.
Royals' head coach Kumar Sangakkara acknowledged the limitation of being on a shoestring budget and how they were ‘caught in the middle’ during the IPL mini auction held in Kochi.
“Our main target in the first round was Brook, but unfortunately we missed out on him. But we are very happy to get Jason Holder, and Donovan Ferreira among a host of good players we think are very promising. Then we could also get Joe Root. I think we have got a good squad," Sangakkara told TOI from Kochi.
At the same time, Royals coach contemplated, "Brook would have fitted well into our side."
Elaborating on what the thought process was, he said, “It was about which addition would make our side better, the first XI that you put out on the field. And the answer was we must target Brook. And next was Holder or maybe Nicholas Pooran. But with a limited budget we really had to plan that out.”
The former Sri Lanka captain added that they were 'caught in the middle'. “It was a complicated kind of decision we had to make in terms of planning for the best case scenario and worst case scenario and we were caught in the middle, but we were well set with a lot of planning, data and thought being put into that. So it was a long process.”
We have the core from last season. The side we retained was a result of us doing so well last season. We have the bowling, we have the batting and we just needed some additions to refine it," he signed off.
Players bought by Royals at IPL mini auction: Jason Holder (5.75 crore), Donovan Ferreira (50 lakh), Kunal Rathore (20 lakh), Adam Zampa (1.5 crore), KM Asif (30 lakh), Murugan Ashwin (20 lakh), Akash Vashisht ( 20 lakh), Abdul P A (20 lakh), Joe Root (1 crore)
