'This may come back and bite us': Australia star reveals potential reason behind going unsold in IPL auction

The Australia star recalled warning a fellow teammate that their decision in IPL 2021 “might come back and bite” them.

The Indian Premier League (IPL) auction saw a number of star players remaining unsold throughout the course of two days. While Australia's T20 World Cup-winning captain Aaron Finch and the skipper of previous year's IPL finalists Eoin Morgan (KKR) were among the big players to have gone unsold, two other Australian players – Kane Richardson and Adam Zampa – also failed to find buyers.

RCB players during IPL 2021.(IPL)

Both Richardson and Zampa were a part of the Royal Challengers Bangalore squad in the 2021 edition of the tournament. Both had withdrawn from the tournament due to personal reasons mid-way through the first phase in India and didn't participate in the second phase which took place in the United Arab Emirates.

Richardson has now opened up on going unsold in the IPL and said that the decision to withdraw from the tournament last season might have hurt their “reputation.”

"I was definitely more shocked for him (Zampa). To be brutally honest, when we left last year, in the circumstances early, I remember having a conversation with him. I said to him, look, this may come back and bite us, and at that time it wasn't a priority for us to be there. We wanted to get back to Australia," ESPNcricinfo quoted Richardson as saying.

"So I think there'd be some kind of buyers that'd be pretty wary of picking us up thinking that we wouldn't come again. I definitely think that's a factor. I'm just speaking on what I think would be a factor in it. I don't know. I've never had a dialogue with a franchise or a person that says that's what would be the case. But I think I didn't go the year before as well with the birth of my boy," he added.

Further talking about the IPL, Richardson said: "So my reputation probably is that in the last couple of years I haven't gone so it's obviously not something that I am. I try and play as much cricket as I can. But I think the circumstances in the last couple of IPLs have made me not go. But it's not a reputation I want."

Richardson recently starred with the ball for Australia in the third T20I against Sri Lanka as the hosts gained an unassailable 3-0 lead in the five-match series.