David Warner by far has been one of the greatest players in the Indian Premier League (IPL) and successfully led SRH to their maiden IPL title victory in 2016, and has also been a consistent run-getter in all the IPL seasons barring the 2021 edition.
Warner was released by SRH after a forgettable 2021 IPL season where he was dropped from captaincy and eventually from the playing XI, Warner is now a part of the auction pool. T
he IPL auction is scheduled for 12th and 13th February where 10 teams will be engaging in a bidding war. 3 franchises – Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB), Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR), and Punjab Kings (PBKS) will be looking for a skipper for their respective teams.
Despite Warner’s great form and numbers, former Indian cricketer Aakash Chopra made a huge prediction for the Australian player in the upcoming IPL mega auction. Aakash Chopra feels that none of them will be picking Warner for the role.
"They can think about it but in my opinion, they will not make him the captain. I believe David Warner will not become the captain of any team although three teams are probably looking for a skipper. Even if we leave out Punjab, still two teams are looking for a captain," Chopra said in a video on his YouTube channel.
RCB will be aiming for a player who can take over the captaincy as Kohli stepped down from the role in the 2021 season. KKR chose not to retain Eoin Morgan despite the England white-ball captain leading them to the final last season.
Punjab Kings are without a captain after KL Rahul opted not to be retained and has joined the Lucknow Super Giants as their captain for IPL 2022.
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Aakash feels that IPL is a small tournament where each franchise has knowledge about each other and hence knows what has taken place in the SRH camp leading to Warner’s release ahead of the 2022 auction.
"He will definitely go to some team or the other. He will go expensive as well but no team will consider him as a captain, that is what I believe because IPL is a small family, everyone has got an idea what happened last year, what were the reasons and the problems. It hasn't really gone down very well amongst the players and the franchises," he explained.
However, Aakash feels that Warner could be a great opening option alongside Kohli in RCB.
"Whether he will be there in the team, he will go somewhere for sure. He might go to RCB. It's not a bad choice that Virat Kohli on one side and David Warner on the other, left-hand and right-hand, and both explosive."
