Indian Premier League is in its 16th year now and the league has gone through so many changes since the inception. New team, new champions, new stars, new rules and format, everything has gone through changes in Indian Premier League. The only thing that remains constant is the misfortune of Royal Challengers Bangalore. When the league started back in 2008, Royal Challengers Bangalore was one of the most-hyped franchises thanks to the flashy owners and star-studded team. Even now the Bangalore based franchise is one of the most popular and most followed franchises in IPL. But they have failed to get the ultimate glory even for once. They came closer to the title several times but could not win the title.
Focus on big names
Royal Challengers Bangalore have a tendency of acquiring big names. In every IPL auction, they focus on the star players across the world and end up with some gaps in the team balance. Moreover, Royal Challengers Bangalore like to add star batters in the side and eventually fail to work on the bowling unit. The story has been same for Bangalore for years. Even in their inaugural season in 2008, they went for big names like Shivnarine Chandrapaul and Wassim Jaffer without thinking of their fitment as T20 batter. Even in the later years, they were heavily dependent on the trio of Chris Gayle, Virat Kohli and AB de Villiers and did not look to fill in other gaps in the team. There were seasons when they heavily invested on someone like Yuvraj Singh who could not deliver for them.
Dependency on few star players
Today RCB trust Virat Kohli along with Faf De Plessis, the captain and Glenn Maxwell. These three have contributed to almost 74% of total runs scored by RCB batters in this IPL. Their combined strike rate of 153.83 was significantly better than rest of the team, who managed to bat at a strike rate of 126.32. The team that boasts of Kohli-Faf-Maxwell is being handled by MahipalLomror, Anuj Rawat in the middle order. They do have Dinesh Karthik in the lower middle order who has not delivered as expected this year.The injury of Rajat Patidar was a big blow for Royal Challengers Bangalore who could not get a proper replacement. But it is probably high time that the franchise start looking for young Indian batters and nurture them for future. Even though the trio of Kohli, du Plessis, and Maxwell is serving them well, the age will soon become a factor.
Bowling hardly gets attention
The gap is bowling department is evident and yet again this is not story from one or two seasons. Royal Challengers Bangalore have hardly given attention to their bowling unit. It’s easy to bat tons of runs at Chinnaswamy Stadium which is traditionally a batting pitch. Still, the way RCB look unsettled when it comes to bowling, speaks of their instability. They have had a few good picks over the years, but the team management somehow messed it up.
For example, Yuzvendra Chahal. It came a surprise when RCB decided to release Chahal who is one of the Purple Cap contenders this season. Their suffering for a good spinner was visible throughout the season. WaninduHasaranga who was trusted to be their primary spinner was unavailable for first few matches but then remained inconsistent in the eight games he played. He could just pick nine wickets and kept delivering loose balls. Shahbaz Ahmed and Michael Bracewell were unimpactful and RCB would be looking for a good spinner next time. They have been unfortunate with the form of Harshal Patel who could not replicate his form from the previous seasons during the death overs, but the key is to invest long term without going after a few good performances.
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