AB de Villiers has compared James Anderson’s inclusion in the IPL 2025 auction to MS Dhoni being retained by CSK as an uncapped player. Anderson, who retired from international cricket earlier in the year, shocked everyone by putting his name in the auction pool for the upcoming season.
Anderson gave himself a base price of 1.25 crore rupees, something De Villiers feels isn’t a lot for a bowler like him. On his YouTube channel, the RCB legend said that Anderson could end up going for his base price, but the pacer is ready to head to India and share the dressing room with a lot of young Indian bowlers.
De Villiers said if he was a team owner he would try to get Anderson for 2 to 3 crires just from an experience standpoint as he knows the game inside out.
“It almost gives me a same kind of feeling with MS Dhoni that he decided to take a pay cut. Yes Jimmy, â¹1.25 crores as a base price, which is not a lot for the status as this guy has got. Maybe he will go for only 1.25 and still be prepared to go to India, leave his family for almost three months and maybe not even play a game and share a dressing room with some of the young Indian fast bowlers.”
“I think it’s fantastic and I was one of the franchise owners and I could get Jimmy for INR 2-3 crores. I would take him purely because I believe that there’s a lot of experience that can be shared with some of the young players, and just his aura and the dressing room will keep the bowling unit confident. This guy knows his game inside out,” he added.
Anderson knows how to win games
Despite his age, De Villiers feels Anderson still knows how to win games for his team and could act like a bowling captain inside any dressing room.
“He is 42 years old and might not be able to execute as well on the park anymore, but he still knows exactly what’s required to win games of cricket with the ball in hand. What I think is I hope someone picks him up purely from an experienced point of view almost having like a bowling captain in the change room where he players a lot of games or not, it doesn’t really matter,” De Villiers said in the same video.
“It’s fantastic that this guy is keen to go over to India for a few months of the year and share his experiences with some of the younger Indian players and other overseas players from around the world,” he concluded.
Anderson went on to comment on his call to put his name in the IPL 2025 auction and said he still has a lot to offer in the game.
