#IPL17: Ben Stokes is on a special mission for England in the tournament, reveals Joe Root

London: After a good show in the limited-overs series against India in January this year, most of the English cricketers saw their bank accounts being inflated at the Indian Premier League (IPL) 2017 auction.

Despite limited money in their purses, franchise owners wanted to make the most of the auction and were keen on signing some big names, mostly English cricketers.

As expected, the bidding war went to another level the moment Ben Stokes' name was announced. One of the hottest properties in world cricket at the moment, the left-handed batsman was bought for a whopping Rs 14.5 crore by Rising Pune Supergiant (RPS).

Stokes, who was mighty impressive across formats during England's tour to India, will be making his IPL debut in the tenth edition of the tournament.

While cricket fans are excited to watch Stokes play in the cash-rich tournament, what many don't know, is that he is on a mission for his national team.

Joe Root, who was recently named as England's Test skipper, revealed that he has asked his compatriot to find weaknesses of RPS skipper Steve Smith, so that the Poms can beat Australia in the Ashes series scheduled for later in the year.

"Smith has become one of the best players in the world. In fact, he is ranked as the best player in the world and is just racking up the runs for fun," Root was quoted as saying by Dailystar.co.uk.

"So the one thing Stokesy can do for us is make sure he finds a little weakness in Smith's armoury for us when we go down to Australia, if he can," he added.

Australia will host England in the Ashes series starting from November 23.

Root also said that this cash-rich league will help English cricketers to improve their game.

"It is great to see a number of English guys getting that exposure to fantastic ex-players and coaches as well as some of the best players in the world," Root said.

Apart from Stokes, Tymal Mills will be another English cricketer to watch out for in the tournament. The T20 specialist was roped in by Royal Challengers Bangalore for Rs 12 crore, as a replacement for Australian pacer Mitchell Starc.