Suresh Raina who is well known as Mr.IPL went unsold during the TATA IPL mega auction which took place in Bengaluru on 12th and 13th February. The veteran batsmen’s name first came out of the bag on Saturday and no franchises had an initial bid of 2 crores which was his base price.
And it was confined that Raina will no longer be part of the upcoming IPL season of 2022 as his name was not in the acceleration round as no team was interested in buying the batsmen.
Raina didn’t have a good 2021 IPL season with the bat as he struggled to score 160 runs in the 11 innings he played for the Yellow Army.
‘Chinna Thala’ the nickname given to him by the CSK fans is one of the all-time greatest players to play the tournament. The 35-year-old batsman is the 4th on the list of highest run-getters in the league. He has 5528 runs to his name in his IPL career and has a batting average of 32.51 with a healthy strike rate which ranges in the region of 135. Raina has 39 half-centuries and a century for the Yellow Army during his time at the franchise.
The Cricket fraternity and fans reacted to the news of Suresh Raina not being part of the upcoming TATA IPL 2022 season.
Below are some reactions of the fans and cricket experts on Twitter.
Changing times. One of the greats of the IPL, Suresh Raina goes unsold.
— Harsha Bhogle (@bhogleharsha) February 12, 2022
Suresh Raina, Ishant Sharma, Piyush Chawla, Amit Mishra. Thank you for the memories, starting that first season in 2008. Will miss you!
— Joy Bhattacharjya (@joybhattacharj) February 13, 2022
Sad not to see a single bid for Mr IPL @ImRaina in the first round.. @IPL #AuctionDay #IPLMegaAuction2022
— Harbhajan Turbanator (@harbhajan_singh) February 12, 2022
Suresh Raina unsold. pic.twitter.com/5Y5PfJAvoy
— Heisenberg ☢ (@internetumpire) February 12, 2022
Sad that not a single team picked Mr. IPL Suresh Raina who has had an extraordinary performance in most IPL tournaments. Someone who has scored 400 runs in most IPLs till now. Many today are heartbroken to see him go unsold.
— Aditya Raj Kaul (@AdityaRajKaul) February 13, 2022