CSK have Cameron Green for INR 21 cr as KKR go hard for Liam Livingstone in ‘Winning Bid’ of Ashwin's mock auction

Kolkata Knight Riders didn’t win Cameron Green in R. Ashwin’s ‘Winning Bid’ mock auction, but their decision to step away at INR 21 cr creates the sharpest storyline.
Because later, KKR channelled the same big wallet energy into Liam Livingstone, eventually landing for INR 18.5 crore.
‘Winning Bid’ is Ashwin’s YouTube-led mock-auction series, pitched as an auction entertainment show, where invited tables bid like IPL teams, with Ashwin playing auctioneer, and the episode builds around bidding wars and ‘sold/unsold’ calls.
How the Cameron Green bidding turned out
Episode 1 of season 2 leans into marquee names early, and Green’s turn at the table becomes the first true blockbuster. In the mock sequence, he walks in with an INR 2 crore base, and the price immediately starts behaving like a headline: Delhi and Lucknow trade punches through leens before Chennai enter the duel. When KKR finally jump in, the tempo changes - bids fly, and the moment it hits INR 21 cr, Kolkata bling and Chennai close the deal.
It is a fascinating player story because Cameron Green’s auction identity is exactly the kind that can fracture a room: a rare package who can bat in the middle order, bowl seam, and upgrade fielding, but also the kind of purchase that forces a team to build the rest of its XI around him. In that sense, KKR’s step away isnt same as disinterest, it’s a price-point decision on a premium profile.
There is also an extra wrinkle around Green this year; even if the winning bid value goes beyond INR 18 crore, that figure may not count the way the casual viewers assume, a bit of complicated auction math that has followed him into the IPL 2026 chatter.
Also Read: SunRisers Hyderabad in dire need of quality spinner: Decoding IPL 2026 auction plans for Pat Cummins' trailblazers
Then comes KKR’s counterpunch: Liam Livingstone
After this, the Liam Livingstone bidding also turned into a tug-of-war that eventually ended with KKR paying INR 18.5 crore, a number that sits below Green’s INR 21 crore, but carries a very different player promise.
Where Green sells you balance, Livingstone sells you impact: instant boundary-hitting, matchup intimidation, and the kind of chaos value that can change a chase in a matter of deliveries. And that is what makes this mock auction’s core angle so neat: KKR let CSK win the Green headline... then wrote their own by baking Livingstone their statement buy.