Uncapped India pacer Kashvee Gautam and Australia all-rounder Annabel Sutherland landed a windfall at the 2024 Women's Premier League Auction, becoming the most expensive buys at INR 2 crore each. Gautam went to Gujarat Giants whereas Sutherland was picked by Delhi Capitals.
WPL 2024 PLAYER AUCTION
Annabel Sutherland, uncapped Kashvee Gautam bag 2 Cr deals
Sutherland is so far the most expensive foreign player sold at INR 2 Cr. © BCCI
Vrinda Dinesh (INR 1.3 crore), Shabnim Ismail (INR 1.2 crore) and Phoebe Litchfield (1 crore) were the others with an eight-digit paycheck.
Gautam, the 20-year-old from Chandigarh, sparked a bidding war among three franchises before eventually going to GG at 20 times her base price. Royal Challengers Bangalore and UP Warriorz were the other two franchises in the hunt for Gautam, who in 2020 had made it to the record books for picking all ten wickets in an innings in the U-19 One-Day Trophy. More recently, Gautam picked a hat-trick for North Zone in the Senior Women's Inter-Zonal T20 Trophy at Lucknow.
For Sutherland, who had a base price of INR 40 lakh, Mumbai Indians went all the way before eventually losing out the bid to DC. Interestingly, both the franchises had the smallest purse going into the auction and went all out in order to fill their only available overseas slot. MI eventually snapped up Shabnim Ismail for INR 1.2 crore, outbidding RCB and GG to secure the fast bowler for the 2024 edition.
In another headline purchase, uncapped opener Vrinda Dinesh was sold to UP Warriorz for INR 1.3 crore, at 13 times her base price. Dinesh, who plays for Karnataka in domestic cricket, has scored 357 runs across 17 T20 matches at a strike rate of 126.10. RCB and GG were the two franchises who went head to head earlier during her auction, with eventual winners UPW joining in at only INR 65 lakh. Giants went all the way up to INR 1.2 crore before losing the bid to Warriorz.
Chamari Athapaththu, Deandra Dottin and Veda Krishnamurthy were among the biggest names to go unsold in the first round. Krishnamurthy though was later picked up by GG at her base price of 30 lakh, but there was no such redemption for Athapaththu, who wasn't picked last year, and Dottin, who was