Shakib the big fish

Star Bangladesh all-rounder Shakib Al Hasan was bought for a mammoth 365,000 dollars by Dhaka Gladiators as he hogged the spotlight during the players' auction of the second edition of the Bangladesh Premier League (BPL) T20.

Six out of the seven franchisees placed their bids for Shakib, who was originally placed in the 'Golden Category' with a base price of 40,000 dollars. It seemed as though the franchisees were involved in a head-to-head tussle with most of the teams offering six-figure digits. Rangpur Riders bid 160,000 dollars while Chittagong Kings and Duronto Rajshahi bid 172,000 and 213,000 dollars respectively. At the end of the day though, it was the Gladiators' bid, the highest of the day, that stole the show.

The second-highest bid of the day was made by the Chittagong Kings for Pakistan opener Imran Nazir for 280,000 dollars. Nazir is expected to take the place of Tamim Iqbal, who was bought by Rajshahi for 165,000 dollars. Had luck favoured the Gladiators though, they would have had both Bangladesh's top stars, Tamim and Shakib, in their team. Both Rajshahi and Dhaka had made equal bids for the dashing left-hander. A coin-toss sent Tamim to Rajshahi. Sylhet bought the Bangladesh captain Mushfiqur Rahim for 205,000 dollars and vice-captain Mahmudullah Riyad was bought by Chittagong for 125,000 dollars.

West Indies mystery spinner Sunil Narine, who'll be available from January 22 to 24, was bought by Barisal Burners for 75,000 dollars. They also bought Saeed Ajmal, who'll be available till January 20, for 115,000 dollars. As per the rules of the tournament, players unavailable for the entire competition will be paid according to the number of matches they play. The Burners, who rode on Chris Gayle in the last edition, will be counting on their T20 specialists Brad Hodge and Azhar Mahmood, who were bought for 125,000 and 150,000 dollars respectively.

Last year's champions, Dhaka Gladiators seemed on a roll in yesterday's auction as they bought a number of valuable players. English players Luke Wright, Owais Shah and Sri Lankan Tillakaratne Dilshan were bought for 75,000 dollars each. All these players though will have a late entry to the league. They also bagged the deadly Lasith Malinga for 115,000 dollars who'll be available after January 30. Bangladesh fast bowler Mashrafe Bin Mortaza was their second-most valuable local player after Shakib as he was bought for 141,000 dollars.

The Chittagong Kings, apart from bagging Nazir and Mahmudullah, got good deals with Ryan ten Doeschate from the Netherlands and New Zealand all-rounder Jacob Oram. They also spent 120,000 dollars on slow left-armer Enamul Haque Jr who plays for Sylhet in the National Cricket League (NCL). Sylhet, on the other hand, will be counting on their young buys Shohag Gazi and Mominul Haque, who were bought for 156,000 dollars and 127,000 respectively.

Newcomers Rangpur Riders got a good bargain with hard-hitting Irish batsman Kevin O' Brien who was bought for 45,000 dollars. They also paid 208,000 dollars for Nasir Hossain, a deal which surpassed Hossain's previous year's bid. As opposed to the more popular trend, Rajshahi spent a lot more money on the local players as they spent more than 350,000 dollars on Jaharul Islam, Ziaur Rahman and Abul Hassan Raju.

Khulna Royal Bengals spent most of their money on Pakistani players as their main buy Shoaib Malik, cost them 85,000 dollars. They also spent 111,000 dollars for Ajmal Shehzad.

SALARY CAP
The salary cap, which limits the biddings placed by the franchisees, was implemented in this year's auction. The cap on the Golden Category was 150,000 dollars (Base Price: 75,000) for the foreign players and 75,000 dollars (Base Price: 40,000 dollars) for the local players. If more than one team bid a value that was higher than the limit, the franchisees would then participate in a 'hidden auction' where the team that bid the highest amount would get the player.

There was also a limit on the amount each franchise could spend at the auction, set at 1.5 million dollars.

As a result of the comparatively low cap placed on local players, all the players in the Golden category were contested for in the 'hidden auction'. For instance, five teams placed the maximum bids for Mushfiqur and there were six teams chasing Tamim.

As per the rules, if a value crosses the cap, 60 per cent of the extended value would go to the Bangladesh Cricket board while 30 per cent to the player and 10 per cent to Game On Sports.

PLAYERS LIST

DHAKA GLADIATORS: Shakib Al Hasan( Bangladesh) Shahid Afridi ( Pakistan), Luke Wright (England), Owais Shah ( England), T. Dilshan (Sri Lanka), Lasith Mlainga ( Sri Lanka), Mohammad Ashraful (Bangladesh), Anamul Haque Bijoy (Bangladesh), Mashrafe Bin Morrtaza (Bangladesh) Joshua Cobb (England), Chris Liddle (England), Darren Stevens (England), Mosharraf Hossain (Bangladesh), Rokibul Hasan (Bangladesh), Soumya Sarkar (Bangladesh), Liton Das (Bangladesh),Mahbubul Alam ( Bangladesh), Saqlain Sajib (Bangladesh)

BARSIAL BURNERS: Saeed Ajmal ( Pakistan), Sunil Narine ( West Indies), Brad Hodge ( Australia), Azhar Mahmood (England), Umar Gul (Pakistan), Kamran Akmal ( Pakistan), Phil Mustard ( England), Alok Kapali ( Bangladesh), Elias Sunny ( Bangladesh), Shuvagata Hom ( Bangladesh), Sabbir Rahman (Bangladesh), Alauddin Babu ( Bangladesh), Iftekhar Naim Ahmed (Bangladesh) Jubair Ahmed, Kabir Ali (England), Al Amin ( Bangladesh), Nazmul Apu ( Bangladesh)

CHITTAGONG KINGS: Imran Nazir (Pakistan), Dwayne Bravo ( West Indies), Mahmudullah (Bangladesh), Wahab Riaz (Pakistan), Ravi Bopara ( England), Ryan Ten Doeschate ( Netherlands), Jacob Oram (New Zealand) , Jason Roy ( England), Brendan Taylor ( Zimbabwe), Naeem Islam ( Bangladesh), Rubel Hossain ( Bangladesh), Arafat Sunny, Enamul Haque Jr, Aftab Ahmed, Marshal Ayub, Kazi Nurul Hasan (Bangladesh).

SYLHET ROYALS : Mushfiqur Rahim ( Bangladesh), Tino Best ( West Indies), Andre Russel ( West Indies), Shohag Gazi ( Bangladesh), Azeem Ghuman (Bangladesh), Zulfiqur Baber ( Bangladesh), Hailton Masakadza ( Zimbabwe), Mominul Haque (Bangladesh), Nazmul Hossain ( Bangladesh) Babar Azam (Bangladesh), Sohrawardi Shuvo (Bangladesh) Paul Stirling ( Ireland).

RANGPUR RIDERS: Fidel Edwards ( West Indies), Nasir Hossain (Bangladesh), Abdur Razzak, Kevin O Brian ( Ireland), Junaed Siddique ( Bangladesh), Imrul Kayes, Sharjil Khan, Anwar Ali, Mehedi Mahruf , Shamsur Rahman, Raja Ali Dar (Pakistan), Taposh Ghosh , Dhiman Ghosh, Md Sharif (Bangladesh.

DURANTA RAJSHAHI : Marlon Samuels (WI), Tamim Iqbal (Bangladesh), Abdul Razzaq ( Pakistan), Mohammad Sami ( Pakistan), Ziaur Rahman ( Bangladesh), Shahzaib Hassan ( Pakistan), Alex Hales ( England), Jaharul Islam ( Bangladesh), Abul Hassan, Farhad Hossain, Moktar Ali (Pakistan), Khalid Latif ( Pakistan), Taijul Islam (Bangladesh) , Sean Ervine ( Zimbabwe), Shaker Ahmed (Bangladesh)

KHULNA ROYAL BENGAL : Shoaib Malik ( Pakistan), Umar Akmal ( Pakistan), Awais Zia ( Pakistan), Umar Amin ( Pakistan), Ahmed Shahzad ( Pakistan), Nazimuddin ( Bangladesh), Shahriar Nafees ( Bangladesh), Farhad Reza ( Bangladesh), Shahadat Hossain ( Bangladesh), Mizanur Rahman (Bangladesh), Md Mithun (Bangladesh), Ricky Wessels, Shane Harwood (Australia), Sanjamul Islam (Bangladesh)