BENGALURU: It is a season of changes for teams in the Indian Premier League (IPL). For Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB), it is also about transition across the board.
For the first time in a decade, superstar Virat Kohli will not be leading the team. Since 2011, the Bengaluru-based franchise will be without their inspirational figure AB de Villiers for the first time. It means a fresh start with the same hope of laying their hands on the elusive trophy.
Led by director of cricket operations Mike Hesson and head coach Sanjay Bangar at the auction table, RCB have a tough task of striking a balance between talent and experience.
For starters, they will have to zero in on a captain. Mumbaikar Shreyas Iyer and David Warner are the potential frontrunners with Iyer holding the edge. RCB are expected to go all out and loosen their purse for either of them or both.
Having retained Kohli, pacer Mohammed Siraj and all-rounder Glenn Maxwell, RCB will look to build a team around them. With Rs 33 crore spent on the trio, they have Rs 57 crore at their disposal to pick a maximum of 15 Indian and seven overseas players.
To put together their successful combination they are likely to stretch themselves in trying to rope in spinner Yuzvendra Chahal, the highly successful Harshal Patel and opener Devdutt Padikkal. Ishan Kishan will be on their wishlist too to fulfil the role of a wicketkeeper-batsman.
With De Villiers out of the picture, another South African could potentially fill his shoes. Teen sensation Dewald Brevis, who is rated as the next ABD, is likely to be on RCB’s radar. The top-order batter and leg- spinner showcased his talent at the U-19 World Cup with 506 runs from six innings and seven wickets.
Middle-order batting and lack of finishers has always been a cause for concern for RCB and they will look to address those issues with Indian talent like Shahrukh Khan, Iyer and Krunal Pandya.
They have a wealth of pace talent to pick from but RCB could zero in on Pat Cummins, Kagiso Rabada, Trent Boult or Lungi Ngidi to fill the slot of a lead foreign pacer.
Although Padikkal has been RCB’s only local noteworthy investment in the past few years, they have plenty of Karnataka talent to choose from. From Prasidh Krishna to the seasoned Manish Pandey and a line-up of proven spinners, the choices are many. But the question is, will RCB go with their usual practice of ignoring local talent.
“Once the retentions were finished and we found out the purses of other teams, it was just a continuation of our scouting program. There were a number of domestic tournaments and our scouts fed information to our coaching team. We then went through a lot of meetings, discussions, watching videos and reaffirming views. Then it was coming up with pecking orders in terms of the roles we want people to play,” New Zealander Hesson told the RCB official channel.
RCB are among the few franchises who have opted not to conduct selection trials and instead rely on data of players collected over a period of time by their talent scouts.
