Sunil Gavaskar Rips Into IPL Teams Buying 'Dummy' Cricketers 'For Crores': "Overrated And Overvalued"

The Indian Premier League (IPL) is not just about international stars. From the time the IPL arrived on the Indian cricket scene, the T20 tournament has been the hotbed of finding new talents and moulding them into big-match players with top-class exposure. From Ravichandran Ashwin to Jasprit Bumrah to Rinku Singh to Vaibhav Sooryavanshi, examples abound of players making it big through the IPL.

Then there have been players who may sell for big bucks but often get found out in the IPL. Indian cricket legend Sunil Gavaskar blasted the scouts from

"A lot of the big hitters in the various State and city leagues that have sprouted up were exposed when faced with the international quality of bowling in the IPL," Gavaskar wrote in Sportstar.

"In the State and city leagues, the standard of both batting and bowling is nowhere near as good, and unless the scouts have a discerning eye and don't get swayed by player agents, the franchises will keep picking players based on these performances and find they have wasted their money."

Without taking any names, Gavaskar wrote that several such examples are there in the IPL wherein a player keeps getting teams based on one exact performance.

"When a franchise picks a player for crores and then doesn't play him in more than a couple of games, it tells you that their scouts and advisers have sold them a dummy. The IPL very quickly finds a player out as being overrated and overvalued. Yet there will be players who will have one performance in the tournament, and it's usually in a match of not much consequence for their team, and on the basis of that performance be picked for another year. One could make at least four teams of such one-match performers who will be picked again and again in the IPL," he added.

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Sunil Gavaskar Royal Challengers Bengaluru Kolkata Knight Riders IPL 2026 Cricket