Australian all-rounder Glenn Maxwell revealed the role of Indian skipper Virat Kohli while floating the idea of him joining the Royal Challengers Bangalore. Maxwell, in a recent interview with RCB, stated that Virat Kohli was in constant contact with him.
IPL 2021: How Virat Kohli played a part in signing Glenn Maxwell
Virat Kohli and Glenn Maxwell were exchanging text messages after the recently conducted ‘Down Under’ series between India and Australia.
“We had been texting a fair bit. We obviously caught up. We chatted after the ODI and T20I series in Australia. He talked to me about potentially playing for RCB. If I got the opportunity, he said ‘we would love to have you. But obviously, there was an auction,” Maxwell said in a video tweeted by RCB. “He said it would be wonderful to have you. He floated the idea back even then. There was a long process in work. Thankfully, I am playing for RCB now,” he added.
Glenn Maxwell was RCB’s prime target in this year’s mini-auction. RCB even conducted a mock auction before the real one while rehearing to buy Maxwell. RCB went on a bidding war against CSK for the ‘Big Show’ of world cricket. The Bangalore-based franchise finally clinched the player for a sum of 14.25 crore.
IPL 2021: Adam Zampa was confident about signing Maxwell
Maxwell revealed that RCB and Australian bowler Adam Zampa gifted him the RCB’s cap a night before the auction. They even clicked a photo with the cap and sent it to skipper Virat Kohli.
“The day of the auction, it was at night time in New Zealand. We were training while in quarantine in New Zealand. Adam Zampa had his RCB hat in his bag, so he took it out and made sure we had a photo,” said Maxwell.
“He sent it to Virat and said ‘Let’s get it over the line. Congratulations I have already given him his first cap! That was before the auction, so it all happened pretty well. It would have looked pretty silly if it didn’t work out that way. He put the picture on afterwards but we took the photo before the auction. Virat said you guys are idiots but in a lovely way,” he said.
