After Mumbai Indians acquired the services of Quinton de Kock, Kings XI Punjab have now traded Marcus Stoinis for Mandeep Singh, acquiring the 26-year-old from Royal Challengers Bangalore.
This swap has been done in IPL’s first trading window, which started after the conclusion of the 2018 edition and will end a month before the auction. A second window will be available for the teams after the auction till the start of the competition in 2019.
Stoinis had been sold to the RCB at the 2018 auctions but KXIP used their Right-To-Match card, paying a whopping INR 6.20 crore. As regards to Mandeep, RCB had outbid KXIP at the auction, and had the winning bid of INR 1.40 crore.
KXIP had a tumultuous last season, finishing second-last despite KL Rahul’s red-hot run of form. Captained by Ravichandran Ashwin, the side struggled with its middle-order and Mandeep Singh’s acquisition seems to be a step towards rectifying that. Mandeep was the designated finisher for RCB but didn’t quite deliver, as 252 runs across 14 matches testify.
