Even though South Africa wicket-keeper batter Quinton de Kock has made a name for himself in the Indian Premier League now, his journey hadn’t started on a fruitful note. A maiden IPL season at Sunrisers Hyderabad didn’t produce ideal results as he managed to play just three matches. However, despite a poor season, he was rewarded handsomely at the auction table the following year.
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Since India’s Parthiv Patel was SRH’s first-choice wicket-keeper batter during IPL 2013, an inexperienced de Kock’s chances were always going to be limited. Furthermore, the likes of Daren Sammy, Thisara Perera, Dale Steyn and Cameron White played a large majority of their matches as four first-choice overseas players.
Having got to bat on each of the three occasions, de Kock scored a mere six runs at an average and strike rate of 2 and 40 respectively. That being said, he still managed to become the most expensive overseas wicket-keeper batter during IPL 2014 auction.
Quinton de Kock Was The Most Expensive Overseas Wicket-Keeper Batter In IPL 2014 Auction
Ahead of the mega auction before the seventh season of the IPL, Hyderabad had retained a couple of players namely Shikhar Dhawan and Steyn.
de Kock, who had registered himself at a base price of INR 1 crore, immediately enticed interest from Kings XI Punjab (now Punjab Kings). Soon enough, Delhi Daredevils (now Delhi Capitals) also joined the race in raising the paddle for a top-order left-handed batter. In fact, a determined attempt allowed them in acquiring his services for INR 3.5 crore.
Daredevils, who hadn’t retained any player before the auction, were once again planning to put together a squad from scratch. Interestingly, they splurged INR 12.50 crore to snap India wicket-keeper batter Dinesh Karthik – who was the most expensive wicket-keeper of IPL 2014 auction.
Talking about overseas keepers, apart from de Kock, only Australia’s Ben Dunk and Zimbabwe’s Brendan Taylor had managed to attract bids from teams that year. While Mumbai Indians had signed Dunk for INR 20 lakh, Sunrisers had bought Taylor for INR 30 lakh.
Quinton de Kock Had Scored Just 6 Runs In IPL 2013
de Kock’s first IPL 2013 opportunity had come against Pune Warriors India away from home. Opening the innings with his team batting first, he managed to score just 2 (8) before being dismissed by PWI pacer Ashok Dinda. Having tried to smash the ball over the cover region, de Kock was caught by all-rounder Mitchell Marsh.
A couple of days later, de Kock took the field against Punjab but failed while chasing a 124-run target. KXIP pacer Praveen Kumar had bowled a brilliant swinging delivery to dismiss the Proteas batter for a duck.
In this last outing against Chennai Super Kings, de Kock started with a boundary on the second ball of the match. Even though there wasn’t much wrong with his shot selection on the following ball as he tried to loft an overpitched delivery over mid-on, Murali Vijay had dived to grab an excellent catch and put and end to a brief knock.
Having made his ODI debut just months before his IPL debut, it was de Kock’s performances in the 50-over format that worked wonders for him. Ahead of IPL 2014 auction, he had scored 741 runs across 16 ODI innings at an average of 46.31 with the help of four centuries.
de Kock, whose last three ODIs before the auction had come against India, had benefited from recency bias on the back of smashing Indian bowlers throughout a three-match series. For those who don’t remember, the prodigy had showed his class in front of the world by scoring three consecutive centuries in home conditions.
