Some of world’s cricket biggest names will be going through anxious times in the forthcoming IPL auction, scheduled to take place in Bangalore on January 27 and 28. As many as 578 players will go under the hammer, with 360 of them from India and 218 players from all the other major cricketing nations.
Among the India U-19 cricketers, who are currently gearing up for their quarter-final clash against Bangladesh in the ongoing U-19 World Cup, nine of them have thrown their hat into the IPL auction ring. Apart from skipper Prithvi Shaw, the likes of Shubman Gill, Himanshu Rana, Abhishek Sharma, Riyan Parag, Kamlesh Nagarkoti, Shivam Mavi, Arshdeep Singh and Harvik Desai will grab everyone’s attention during the auction.
Ahead of the all-important quarter-final match on Friday (January 26), India U-19 coach Rahul Dravid has suggested the boys to focus on their job rather than things which are not in their control.
"There's no point hiding from the fact that it is there. It is around the corner," Dravid said according to ESPNCricinfo.
"There's no point living in the bubble and pretending it doesn't exist. We do discuss it. We've spoken about what their focus should be and what their long-term goals are as compared to their short-term goals," he added.
Dravid further elaborated why one or two auctions can’t decide the fate of a player and the budding cricketers should think about the long-term.
"The auction is not something the boys can control. One or two auctions won't really have a long-term impact on their careers. There is an auction every year, but not every year will they have an opportunity to play for India in possibly a World Cup semi-final. That doesn't come very often," opined the Indian U-19 and India ‘A’ coach.
"I like the energy and the spirit in this team. We've been here for three weeks and we couldn't have asked for better preparation from the boys. They've been superb. We talked about the auction once and we said let's keep that out of our minds,” he explained.
India U-19 team have registered victories in all of their 3 group matches against Australia, Papua New Guinea and Zimbabwe. Talking about the knockout clash against Bangladesh, Dravid said: "We're not thinking past the next game against Bangladesh. We lost to them in the Asia Cup. We are aware of the fact that Bangladesh is a good team. We haven't even looked at the rest of the draw. The focus is right now on doing well against Bangladesh.”
“We had a week off, that was actually part of the challenge, managing at this age, boys are keen to play, at this age a week off can be a long time. So we had a day off and they got out a bit and relaxed. Today had a light session. Sometimes it's just a question of hoping they don't get too overexcited," concluded the Indian batting legend.
