Indian Premier League (IPL) 2020 auction to take place in December: Report

The Indian Premier League (IPL) 2020 auction will be taking place in December this year, according to a report in Mumbai Mirror. Although the tournament will take place in April, it is learnt by the news outlet that the auction will take place this year. The report further states that this season, it will be a mini auction with a ₹3 crore increment to the salary cap, which means the teams can spend up to ₹86 crore.

According to the report, Kings XI Punjab have shortlisted four prominent names to take over the position of head coach. The names in fray are former England coach Andy Flower, former Australia coach Darren Lehmann, Mike Hussey and George Bailey. The position has been vacant since Mike Hesson cut short his two-year agreement and took over as team director of Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB).

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Besides the appointment of Hesson, Royal Challengers Bangalore also roped in Australian Simon Katich as the team’s head coach. Shankar Basu rejoined RCB as the strength and conditioning coach. Former India cricketer Sridharan Sriram was appointed as the batting and spin bowling coach of the Kohli-led side.

Despite having stars like Virat Kohli, AB de Villiers and Chris Gayle (for better part), RCB has not won the IPL since the event’s inception. Kohli has led the team in seven of those seasons.

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Hesson nipped questions on Kohli controlling the team and change in captaincy in the bud. “We don’t have that perception that Virat controls things. But may be he has had his learnings from the past (mistakes) while moving forward,” Hesson said during a media interaction on Thursday.

Hesson said Kohli has been on the same page as him and chief coach Simon Katich.“There has been no question mark over Virat’s captaincy during last couple of weeks (of discussions),” Hesson clarified.