Vijay Shankar, an Indian all-rounder, is a proud skipper. The 31-year-old was given the job of captaining the Tamil Nadu squad in the Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy just a few months ago after regular skipper Dinesh Karthik was ruled out due to injury.
Shankar proved the management’s faith in him by leading Tamil Nadu to their second consecutive title. To win the famous trophy, the squad thrashed Karnataka by four wickets. The players also created a lot of noise for their outstanding performance throughout the event.
The Tamil Nadu players’ outstanding success in the domestic event earned them a lot of attention during the mega-auction. Over the course of two days, a number of Tamil Nadu players were auctioned off, causing bidding wars among the ten franchises.
For the cash-rich league, all of the teams were keen to obtain local match-winning talent. In the IPL 2022 auction, Shahrukh Khan was the most expensive Tamil Nadu purchase. Punjab Kings, Shahrukh’s former club, paid a record Rs 9 crore to retain his services. Sunrisers Hyderabad paid Rs 8.5 crore for all-rounder Washington Sundar, while RCB paid Rs 5.5 crore for Dinesh Karthik.
Shankar published an emotional letter on his Twitter profile, since most of the players from Tamil Nadu’s winning squad for the Syed Mushtaq Ali trophy will be representing various IPL teams. The 31-year-old praised the state as the “cradle” of modern Indian cricket and predicted that their new sides would win matches.
“The cradle of contemporary Indian cricket is Tamil Nadu.” What an incredible year it has been. The Syed Mushtaq Ali competition was won by a supremely skilled Tamil Nadu team, and now the players are distributed throughout the IPL teams, adding spice and flavour to the world’s largest T20 league. Tamil Nadu Cricket is still alive and well. I’m proud to be a player and captain in Tamil Nadu cricket’s golden period.
Ravisrinivasan Sai Kishore, T Natarajan, and Murugan Ashwin are other Tamil Nadu crorepatis who were selected by Gujarat Titans, SRH, and CSK, respectively. At the huge event, Hari Nishanth, N Jagadeesan, Sai Sudharshan, and Sanjay Yadav all attracted consumers. Shankar, the captain, will play for Gujarat after being selected for Rs 1.4 crore.