"Expected him to go for more": SRH coach Daniel Vettori on acquiring Travis Head

DUBAI: Sunrisers Hyderabad coach Daniel Vettori expressed his delight to acquire Australia's star opener Travis Head as he expected to go him for a bit more. Head, who produced remarkable performances in the World Test Championship final and the ODI World Cup final earlier this year, was one of the names with a hefty price tag.

Chennai Super Kings and Sunrisers Hyderabad were engaged in a fierce bidding battle. However, Head became a part of the Orange family for a price tag of Rs 6.8 crore.

"It is sort of tough to talk about what happened last season, but we were pretty adamant to get in left-handed batsmen. With Markram, Klaasen and Glenn Phillips in the squad, and with Brook there in the middle, felt there was a similarity between the four of them. So we just wanted to get some options," Vettori said during a press conference.

"Everyone knows how well he has been playing for an extended period of time now. So we are grateful to get him at that price. We expected him to go for more. The captaincy is just wait and see really. We don't want to burden guys just at this stage. There is a lot of cricket before the IPL, so we have to get through that and we can make a decision closer to the time," Head added.

The left-handed batter has been in fine form for the Aussies, scoring centuries in the World Test Championship final and ICC Cricket World Cup finals against India. In 23 T20Is, he has scored 554 runs at an average of 29.15 and a strike rate of over 146, with one fifty.

Overall in 107 T20s, he has scored 2,494 runs at an average of 27.71 and a strike rate of over 134, with one century and 10 fifties.