Flintoff And Pietersen Top IPL Auction

England stars Andrew Flintoff and Kevin Pietersen have become the most valuable cricketers in the world after fetching the highest price at the Indian Premier League auction with both players going for a record $1.55m (£1.1m) each.

Flintoff, who had a reserve auction price of $950,000, was snapped up by the Chennai Super Kings while Pietersen will turn out for Bangalore after topping his reserve value of $1.35m at the 2009 IPL auction in Goa.

The amounts will be paid as salary but will be pro-rated on a match-by-match basis with the England players only available to play for the first three weeks of the IPL’s six week-run following a deal between the Twenty20 tournament organisers and the England and Wales Cricket Board.

Of the other England players in the auction, Ravi Bopara went to Kings XI Punjab for $450,000, while Owais Shah and Paul Collingwood joined Delhi for $375,000 and $275,000 respectively.

All England players will have to pay 10% of their share of their auction price to their counties as way of compensation for missing the first few rounds of the English domestic season.

There were no bidders for the other two England players in contention, Sussex batsman Luke Wright and Nottinghamshire all-rounder Samit Patel.

Their only chance of making the IPL this year is if the franchises pick them up as replacements for the Pakistani players, who have been barred from taking part by their government.

Commissioner Lalit Modi said: ‘There are only limited slots, there are 50 players and you cannot expect to have all the players sold.

‘The teams have strategies and they normally put in a lot more players so that they get the other teams to bid for them in the hope of upsetting their plan.’

Flintoff and Pietersen’s values broke the previous transfer record set at the inaugural 2008 auction, when Chennai paid $1.5m (£1.04m) for India captain Mahendra Singh Dhoni. All contracts were for two seasons, rather than the three of last year.

England players were not involved in the auction last year because of international commitments and will be restricted to half this year’s tournament because of the home Test series against the West Indies in April and May.

The 2009 IPL season will be held from 10th April to 29th May.