Australian power-hitter Glenn Maxwell will be back in the players’ auction of Indian Premier League (IPL) 2021 after Kings XI Punjab (KXIP) released him ahead of the bidding process. The swashbuckling all-rounder had a disastrous outing in IPL 2020 in United Arab Emirates (UAE) where he failed to score even one six for his franchise KXIP.
After the poor season in IPL last year, the 32-year-old T20 specialist showed his rich form in Australia’s limited-overs fixtures against India. He carried the momentum in the recently concluded Big Bash League (BBL) 2020-21 and finished the tournament as second-highest run-getter for his team Melbourne Stars.
Now, Maxwell has set his base price at INR 2 crore for the mini-auction, and quite a few teams will be eager to secure the services of big-hitting Victorian in the fourteenth season of the cash-rich league.
However, days before the special event, Maxwell has expressed his desire to join Virat Kohli-led Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB). He said joining RCB will also help him fulfil his long-time wish to play alongside his idol and former South Africa cricketer AB de Villiers.
“That’ll be awesome. AB [is] one of my idols and one of the guys I’ve always tried to watch the way he goes about [things],” said Maxwell as quoted by ESPNCricinfo.
“It’ll be awesome to work with him, and he’s always been really helpful to me along the journey. Whenever I’ve caught up with him, he’s been brilliant. So to be able to work with him first hand will be pretty cool,” he added.
De Villiers has been associated with RCB since 2011, scoring 4178 runs from 141 matches at an impressive strike-rate of 159.46 with two hundreds and 35 half-centuries. For the Challengers, De Villiers has also smashed 339 fours and 222 sixes.
Maxwell also said that he ‘gets along’ well with the RCB skipper Kohli and he would definitely enjoy batting with the Delhi-lad.
“I get along with Virat pretty well. It’ll be certainly nice to work under Virat and will certainly enjoy batting with him – that’s for sure,” Maxwell added further.
