Why Goenka Went All Out To Get Pant

Rishabh Pant made history last week, becoming the most expensive buy ever at an IPL auction.

Lucknow Super Giants spent a massive Rs 27 crore (Rs 270 million) to hire Pant's skills.

LSG Owner Sanjiv Goenka revealed why the franchise went all out for Pant at the auction.

Citing the example of Pant's much talked about manoeuvre during the last T20 World Cup where he delayed the game when India were down and out against South Africa, Goenka told Aakash Chopra: 'I saw a video of Rishabh where he did dramebaazi on the field. He slowed the momentum. I liked that attitude a lot, that you have that extra thought to change the momentum when everything was going against us by removing the pads.

'From that time, I had in my mind that if only Rishabh had been in my team.

'That one thing of his appealed to me a lot. Along with that, he came back from a near-fatal injury, and he has come back to a form which is better than his original form. So that resilience and ability to fight and rise again matter a lot.'

'Rishabh is 27. I hope he will be with LSG for the next 10, 12 years,' Goenka added.

'Our internal feeling is that our auction was very good. Our focus was that our middle order and finishing should be very strong. So, that number three to eight are very strong,' Goenka said.

'Another thing we wanted was to go with an Indian pace attack, instead of international pace, and we went with explosive international batters. So, now we have got a combination of the two.'