The IPL 2023 is nearing its end with the Gujarat Titans and Chennai Super Kings reaching the final. The Indian Premier League 2023 tournament was perhaps the highest scoring IPL season of all time, with a number of 200+ totals being put and a few of them even being chased down.
The tournament has seen some exceptional performances from those players who were picked up as low prices, and, as expected, some of the expensive signings have underperformed, or delivered well beyond what was expected of them.
Here are 3 expensive players who didn’t live up to expectations in IPL 2023:
Sam Curran
The Punjab Kings made Sam Curran the most expensive player ever in IPL history by splurging INR 18.5 crore on the England all-rounder at the IPL 2023 auction. The auction happened after Curran produced a Man of the Tournament show in the World T20 in Australia.
However, the lengths he bowled in Australia didn’t work in Indian conditions and the ground sizes in India was much smaller compared to the Australian grounds.
Curran finished Indian Premier League 2023 with 10 wickets in 14 matches at an economy of 10.22. He had a better season with the bat: 276 runs at a strike rate of 135.
Ben Stokes
The England Test captain Ben Stokes was brought in for INR 16.25 crore by CSK in the Indian Premier League 2023 auction. Stokes only played a couple of matches at the start of the tournament, but was then sidelined due to injury. When he was fit, however, Stokes couldn’t get into the side because Conway, Ali, Pathirana, and Theekshana had cemented their places.
In 2 knocks for CSK this season, Stokes scored 15 runs and bowled 1 over for 18 runs, and he left ahead of the playoffs to prepare for the Ashes.
Harry Brook
Harry Brook was signed for a whopping INR 13.25 crore by SRH in the Indian Premier League 2023 auction on the back of his scintillating form in Test cricket in England’s Bazball team. Brook hit one century – a century at the flat Eden Gardens track – apart from that, he failed miserably and because of Brook, SRH had to shuffle up their batting order as well.
Brook finished Indian Premier League 2023 with 190 runs in 11 innings at an average of 21 and strike rate of 123.
