Lucknow Super Giants (LSG) broke the bank for star wicketkeeper Rishabh Pant at the Indian Premier League (IPL) Mega Auction last month, acquiring his services for Rs 27 crore. LSG’s bid Pant the most expensive buy ever in the history of IPL players’ auction, surpassing PBKS’ bid of Rs 26.75 crore for Shreyas Iyer earlier in the day. Fast forward to present, LSG owner Sanjiv Goenka has revealed the science behind the record-breaking bid for Pant, who was released by Delhi Capitals (DC) ahead of the IPL 2025 mega auction.
Goenka suggested that he knew DC co-owner Parth Jindal “was crazy” for Pant and would’ve gone all in to get back Pant, having missed the chance to rope in Iyer, who was sold to PBKS for Rs 26.75 crore.
“There was science behind going at 27 Cr for Rishabh Pant. Delhi went at 26.5 Cr for Shreyas Iyer. So, then my feeling was, ‘Parth Jindal is so crazy for Rishabh Pant, he would go one up at the IPL Auction.’ So, the idea was to go two up from Parth, or even three up, and that is where he would stop. For Rishabh, we had calculated three scenarios, and in all of them, he was very important to us,” Goenka said on Ranveer Allahbadia‘s YouTube channel.
LSG had kept about Rs 25-27 crore for Pant as they needed a captain, so when DC decided to exercise the RTM at Rs 22 crore, they knew that they had to bid more than Rs 26 crore to stop DC for snatching the player from them.
“We knew we were going to get him, and we had kept between 25 and 27 crores for him in all our planning. So, when the bidding stopped for Rishabh at 21-22 Cr, DC did not waste even a second to use RTM for him. So that means they were willing to go to the full extent that we have to take Rishabh,” he added.
Goenka insisted had LSG had missed out on Pant, they would’ve missed the presence of an Indian anchor in their squad.
“We knew we were going to get him, and we had kept between 25 and 27 crores for him in all our planning. So, when the bidding stopped for Rishabh at 21-22 Cr, DC did not waste even a second to use RTM for him. So that means they were willing to go to the full extent that we have to take Rishabh,” Goenka further revealed.
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