IPL 2024 Auction: Mitchell Starc reacts to becoming most expensive player in history

Mitchell Starc made history on Tuesday after he was sold for Rs 24.75 crore to Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) at the IPL 2024 Auction. Starc is now the most expensive player in the history of the league and broke his teammate Pat Cummins’ record which was set a while before Starc went under the hammer. Cummins was bought by Sunrisers Hyderabad (SRH) for Rs 20.5 crore. After etching his name in history, Starc said that the amount KKR has spent on him is beyond his imagination and now looks forward to filling Cummins’ shoes at KKR. “Nothing I could have dreamt of (on going for Rs 24.75 crore),” he said on JioCinema. “Obviously, a few teams were looking to bolster their pace attacks and there are a plethora of brilliant skill sets and names on their auction list, with Pat (Cummins) being one of them, and going to Dan’s (Daniel Vettori) team in Hyderabad. I wasn’t sure where I would end up, but I am thrilled to be a part of KKR. It’s a team that Pat was at, so hopefully, I can fill his boots there and be very successful.” Cummins spent the majority of his IPL career at KKR who had paid Rs 15.5 crore for the Australian skipper in the 2020 auction. Overall, he has taken 45 wickets in 42 matches and has scored 379 runs at a strike rate of 152.21. Starc will be returning to IPL after a gap of eight years, he last played in the league in 2015 and has 34 wickets from 27 matches. On making himself available for IPL 2024, he said, “I have prioritized international cricket and wanted to prioritize Test cricket as well, playing as much and as well as I could for Australia. That was my thought process leading up to the last number of years. “Coming into the back end of this year and heading into next year, it’s a lot quieter on the international scene for the Australian group. It’s a great chance to get involved in the IPL. Obviously, there’s a T20 World Cup coming up next year and there’s a good chance to play some really competitive T20 cricket in the best T20 league with the world class players we see on all the lists.”