Ponting for nothing, and other crazy deals

Ricky Ponting might be one of the best bats in the business, but that didn’t really...

Ricky Ponting might be one of the best bats in the business, but that didn’t really show on the cheque books. Kolkata snapped up the Aussie captain for US$ 400,000, quite a bargain under the circumstances. Players that were purchased for more than him?

Herschelle Gibbs (HYD, US$575,000), Jacques Kallis (BAN, US$900,000) and even Suresh Raina (Chennai, US$ 650,000)!

We expected there to be a rush for ’keepers, we just didn’t expect them to chase New Zealand’s Brendan McCullum like he was made of gold. Hyderabad finally bagged the stumper for US$ 700,000 — four times more than his base price of US$175000 .

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Hyderabad spent as much on McCullum as Hyderabad did on Gilchrist and Mohali on Sangakkara. Good buy?

A surprise big-money earner was Mohammad Kaif. Forgotten by Team India for a while now, the UP batsman will laugh all the way to Jaipur with a handy US$ 675,000. His base price, incidentally, was US $ 125,000. Manoj Tiwary, who has a one-day international aggregate of zero runs in one match, gets US$ 625,000 (base price: US$ 100,000) from the Delhi Daredevils.

Erm… Matthew Hayden has reason to be unhappy with the US$ 375,000 he gets from Hyderabad.

Two surprises in the top bracket are Aussies Cameron White and David Hussey, both T20 specialists from Victoria. Bangalore bought White for US$ 500,000, while Kolkata snapped up David Hussey for US$ 625,000. We’re not too convinced …

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Ishant Sharma, who bowled the fastest delivery by an Indian last week, should be pleasantly surprised when he hears about the big packet. Bidding for the Delhi quick started at a modest US$ 150,000, and was finally sold to Kolkata for a whopping US$ 950,000. Fellow quick RP Singh also got a big purse, Hyderabad shelling out US$ 850,000 for the UP pacer.