Simple experiment. Easily doable. Show someone who’s been following the squad of the Royal Challengers Bangalore over the years but doesn’t follow the IPL all that much.
Now ask, “how many times do you reckon might the RCB have won won the title?”
Point is- do you need to be a pundit to know the thing? There’s very little chance the answer will be “zero”, but such has been the journey of RCB in the famed T20 league one can’t image the sport without, at least in the sub-continent.
Frankly, the RCB are a team of T20 superstars but it’s one with a bit of a problem.
Same as a paper tiger; looks strong on the paper before every season but fails to perform up to the expectations.
What’s the reason for that? Well, there have been quite a few reasons in the past and there’s no point discussing them now, so we’ll not be talking about them right now. RCB’s performance this season was good but not according to the full potential of their squad. Injuries were a big reason for that but there are few areas which they can fix to get better in the next IPL season.
Let’s, as fans who would love to see a team lit with potential examine what might they want to do differently?
At Least Two Good Death Bowlers
Death bowling has been a headache for RCB and it has been the biggest factor or one of the biggest factors for their poor performance in the league till now.
Although, this year they tried to fix that by picking Chris Morris but he got injured and missed a majority of the games, which affected their campaign badly and that’s why they need to have at least two good death bowlers in the playing XI. What do you think?
Delhi Capitals reaching the finals this year or Mumbai Indians’ domination in the league are two prime examples of having, at least, two good death bowlers in the side.
RCB’s bowling- powerful that it may seem- will become lethal provided they get another good death bowler quite like the Protea.
Guess what? There’s Navdeep Saini, while they already have Mohammad Siraj and Washington Sundar with the new-ball.
That’s not all since Yuzvendra Chahal- easily the pick of the bowlers- is in the middle overs.
This move- might- prove to be a great help for the side we expect the world of but one that eventually underscores.
Stop Over-Depending on Virat and AB
It’s very clear that RCB heavily depend on Virat Kohli and AB de Villiers in the batting department to score the bulk of the runs and If they perform, RCB wins and if they don’t then RCB loses and this has been the case for the past few seasons now and they need to fix it for them to succeed as a side.
In this season Virat wasn’t at his best and it clearly affected the team’s performance. Does that tell us something about over dependence?
Virat took some time to get going, as a result of which Bangalore were the slowest in scoring runs between overs 7-15.
Who knows how badly might that have hurt the team’s chances?
It actually shows that you can’t depend on one or two players to win you games every time unless this is la-la land or some actual superhero movie where the rest of the star-cast is a benchwarmer whilst one man dominates.
Alas, in case of the RCB one does self-capitulate.
Moeen Ali could’ve been a good option in the middle overs but he didn’t get enough chances. But then one must understand that this is a team that’s been trying its best to get the balance of the set-up right. Devdutt Paddikal was excellent this season. RCB needs to find a good opening partner for him and a good middle-order batsman to accompany Virat and AB.
There are quite a few options for RCB to fix the loopholes, for instance Virat or even Washington Sundar opening with Devdutt or bringing Parthiv Patel back, etc. It will be interesting to see how the RCB management handles this.
Strong Core of Indian Players
Cricket, regardless of what we all call it or hail it as, is still very much a team-baed spot. This holds the key to understand the different processes one undertakes to get the winning combination going.
The core of the successful sides like the Mumbai Indians or the Chennai Super Kings mainly consists of good Indian players.
Apart from Devdutt Paddikal, Yuzvendra Chahal, and Washington Sundar alongside Virat Kohli, no Indian player showed some promise or performed well in IPL2020. Mohammad Siraj did well with the new ball in the later phase of the tournament.
Gurkeerat Singh Mann, Shivam Dubey, Umesh Yadav, et cetera failed to perform as required from them which resulted in more pressure on the other guys, especially Virat and AB.
RCB need to form a core of good Indian players added with the overseas players as it is very necessary for any team to succeed in the IPL.
I know I told you that we won’t be talking about the past problems for the RCB but- death bowling, the over dependency on Virat and AB (with due respect to the legends), are age-old problems that need fixing now.
Furthermore, the team management plays a very important role in fixing that and if they can, then RCB can be the side to beat in the IPL.
Having said that, the most important thing RCB needs to do along with the above mentioned things is playing quality cricket and that’s most important.
Thanks for reading.
Now let’s go back to supporting the RCB for in the heart of the infinitely optimistic there’ll always be hope that they bounce back stronger. And guess what? Hope is underrated.
