Jerome Vinith, Ashwal Rai, C. Ajithlal and A. Karthik...these are the four who could attract the biggest bids in Tuesday’s Prime Volleyball League’s player auction.
They are among the country’s most valuable players and stood out in the Asian Championship in Japan in September where India finished ninth. Tom Joseph, one of the country’s best players, added G.S. Akhin to that list.
“But it won’t be easy for coaches to pick the players. You have a budget of ₹75 lakh and once you pick the two foreign stars, you are left with something like ₹45 lakh,” Sunny Joseph, the Kolkata Thunderbolts coach, told The Hindu.
“For a top category (platinum) Indian player, teams will have to pay between ₹8 to 15 lakh, while the next category is from ₹4 to 10 lakh and the last is ₹1.5 to 4 lakh. The problem is, if you go after good players automatically you won’t have much to give the lower category players. So, it’s a tough task.”
But more than the cash, players are thrilled just to see the league come back.
“It’s a fresh beginning for volleyball and for us, I hope the league will run for many years.
“A player’s career runs for a few years, I’m 29 now and I’ve lost nearly three important years of my playing life. I won’t get them back,” said Jerome. “We’re just hungry to get back to the league.”
