At the Indian Premier League (IPL) 2024 auction a total of 332 players went under the hammer in Dubai. At one end it was Australian pacer Mitchell Starc who was sold for INR 24.75 crore to the two-time champions Kolkata Knight Riders whereas his teammate Pat Cummins was picked by Sunrisers Hyderabad for INR 20.50 crore.
A total of 72 players were sold and INR 2,30,45,00,000 were spent on December 19 at the Coca-Cola Arena. However, big names such as Steve Smith and Karun Nair remained unsold.
Apart from the IPL 2024 auction, Gujarat Titans were able to bring in eight new players which included the likes of Azmatullah Omarzai, Umesh Yadav, Shahrukh Khan, Sushant Mishra, Kartik Tyagi, Manav Suthar, Spencer Johnson, Robin Minz.
However, it will be young opener Shubman Gill, who will be leading the franchise. Gill was the highest run scorer in the previous edition of the Indian Premier League as he scored 891 runs from 16 matches. Gill also scored two hundreds in the whole tournament.
Shubman Gill has never led any team in his whole cricketing career and it will be the first captaincy experience for the Indian opener.
IPL 2024 Auction: Ashish Nehra opens up on the mix of experience and youth in Gujarat Titans
The team’s head coach Ashish Nehra believes that the Gujarat Titans is a mix of young and experienced players.
In a conversation with GT, Ashish Nehra said, “Yes we released a few fast bowlers and we were definitely looking for some quality with a mix of experience and youth. We got Umesh Yadav and Spencer Johnson, so were are very happy and we are pretty a settled team. It was just an addition, we have a luxury of 25 players, so every franchise can do that.”
“I am happy or not happy right now it is what it is (laughs). I am very pleased whoever we wanted we pretty much got it,” he said when asked how happy was he after the auction.
“Nothing changes, same thing, whatever best we can do from outside and whatever help I can do, the whole support staff means that way. We are just trying to support the players, I am not saying this only because we have played the two finals in the last two seasons. Results are important, but I am someone who looks at the results all the time.
“We are happy that we got the results as well what kind of team we have. We have a great mix of youngsters and experience. This auction also, we have Robin Minz, an exciting player, Kartik Tyagi can bowl fast, he has shown what he can do and we will try to help out what we can do.”
“GT is a great mix of experience and youngsters. We’re a pretty settled team.”
? Watch Head Coach Ashish Nehra look back at last night’s #IPLAuction as he looks forward to yet another memorable season.#AavaDe | #IPL2024 pic.twitter.com/i2I9lxIAX7
— Gujarat Titans (@gujarat_titans) December 20, 2023
Gujarat Titans won the Indian Premier League in their debut season under the captaincy of Hardik Pandya and played the final against Chennai Super Kings last year. However, the team will have a daunting task to replace Hardik, which will not be easy.
The team has the likes of Shubman Gill, David Miller, and Mohammad Shami who are the modern-day greats. The franchise has all the power to lift yet another IPL title and also cause problems for teams such as Chennai Super Kings and Mumbai Indians.