New Delhi: A day after money-spinning deals at Indian Premier League Auction 2024 in Dubai, Punjab Kings (PKBS) on Wednesday issued a clarification over its blunder and picking up of ‘wrong’ player. The IPL franchisee, facing flak over its gross disrespect to an uncapped player Shashank Singh took to social media and claimed that the player was always on their priority list and they didn’t want to demean anyone.
“The confusion happened because of 2 players of the same name being on the list,” the franchisee stated in an attempt to contain the backlash that it received for going back on its words and refusing to take the player in squad.
Shashank Singh, the 32-year old player was first picked by the Punjab Kings and then the owners wanted to cancel his bidding. A lot of cricket fans objected to this unfair & unethical trade practice of the franchisee and trolled it with memes.
How Punjab Kings committed blunder
The IPL Auction 2024 in Dubai was no less than a gripping blockbuster as the jaw-dropping price tags of noted players kept the franchisee owners on their toes and kept the cricket fans on the edge.
While the 10 franchisees bought capped & uncapped players at staggering prices, a blunder by Punjab Kings left the audience in splits.
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Punjab Kings was on a buying spree of uncapped players towards the fag end of the auction. As the auction accelerated towards end, the franchisee picked 2 uncapped players – Vishwanath Pratap Singh & Ashutosh Sharma.
When Shashank Singh’s turn came, co-owner Priety Zinta raised the paddle after brief discussion with team. Auctioneer Mallika Sagar received the opening bid and put it up for public auction but no one evinced interest. This eventually led to Shahshank Singh going into PKBS bag.
As the auction moved to next stage, the owners of PKBS looked discontent and raised a flag over wrong picking of player. The chaos among the owners surfaced as they opined at not picking the given player. However, Mallika Sagar said, The hammer has come down. Player 236 & 237 both went to you.
Ness Wadia, co-onwer of the franchisee argued but it was denied by Mallika.
Confusion over 2 Shashanks
In the IPL bidding, two Shashank Singh featured. While 19 year old Shashank is yet to play any first-class cricketer, the 32-year old is the batting all-rounder who has been a part of Delhi Capitals.
