Last Updated on 4 years by Charbel Coorey
Cricket News: 3 challenges RCB must overcome to win 1st title | 3 challenges RCB must overcome to win their 1st IPL Title
Royal Challengers Bangalore is one of the teams that emerges as one of the contenders to win the Indian Premier League before the start of every season. However, they’ve failed to live up to the expectations of the “Ee Saala Cup Namde” fan army.
Since the beginning of the IPL, they have not managed to win the trophy despite having some of the world’s best players. They have managed to reach finals thrice but ended up losing on all the occasions.
On some occasions it seemed like the target was at the doorstep, at other times, the team completely lost the address. RCB has always had superstars, but when it came to delivering the goods, the team has faltered.
So what are the challenges that the Bangalore based franchise need to overcome in order to gift their fans a first ever IPL title in 2020? Let’s find out-
Over-dependence on ABD
Dependency on a particular player is really a short term option in T20 leagues, but in an environment like IPL, you can get exposed. A player on which RCB has relied a lot since his debut for the franchise.
AB de Villiers was bought by the RCB management in the IPL 2011 player auction and since then he’s been the heart of the franchise alongside his good friend Virat Kohli. The Proteas legend has been the backbone of the RCB batting line-up along with Kohli for several seasons and has successfully managed to steal victory from the jaws of defeat on many occasions, thus making him a vital cog of the team. His brilliance has helped RCB in pulling off remarkable wins from seemingly improbable situations
However, since the last few years or so RCB’s over dependency on their 360° player is such that they’ve always found it tough to win whenever ABD fails with the bat. Such has been the impact of one player in the lineup. If the opposition managed to get rid of de Villiers early then more often than, RCB are on the wrong side of the result.
Kohli generally bats at the top which means AB has to take responsibility for the middle order which he has been doing very well over the years. Having both ABD and Kohli has been a big plus for RCB but it can’t rule out the fact that the over reliance on de Villiers has been a worrying issue for them. Despite all the superhuman things AB does on the field he still needs support and if other players can take their share of responsibility then RCB will be better in a place to claim their maiden title win.
Death bowling options
Over the years, RCB has always been a side with proven match winners in the batting group but when it comes to noting down the same league of players in the bowling department then you’ll not find many players there.
Lack of quality in the bowling group has been a worrisome issue for the Challengers. If one has to point to the weakest link in the bowling department then it’ll be their death bowling attack. RCB never actually had great death bowling options and that also has something to do with their irregularity in selections and continuous chopping and changing the squad.
In a format like T20, you need specialist bowlers who can do the job for the team in the last few overs. Mitchell Starc, Tymal Mills, Tim Southee, Chris Woakes, are few big names that RCB has tried over the years but they never give a consistent run to any bowler who could be their go to option in the slog overs. Teams that have won IPL in the past had good death bowlers, for example- Lasith Malinga for Mumbai Indians, Dwayne Bravo for Chennai Super Kings, or even Bhuvneshwar Kumar for Sunrisers Hyderabad. RCB’s struggle in the world’s toughest T20 league has a lot to do with their continuous struggle in the death bowling department.
This season, Mohammad Siraj looks their best bet for the death overs, as Harshal Patel is yet to replicate his early season form on better batting pitches. Also, Kyle Jamieson continues to be expensive, so RCB need to deliver at this stage.
Overcoming mental hurdle of past failures
It’s still a mystery why RCB are yet to bag an IPL title as they always had the talent in the squad to get over the line but unfortunately due to some reasons they never got the taste of the trophy.
The mistake RCB’s management has repeatedly made for almost a decade is buying/retaining a few star batsmen while completely neglecting all other departments. They’ve lost the final on three occasions in 2009, 2011, and 2016 while they ended in the bottom half for the 3 consecutive years starting from 2017 to 2019. The ghosts of the past still haunt the team and the team would like to overhaul the past failures and focus on the present process to get the result in form of their first ever IPL trophy win. Team RCB can take the learnings from the past failures and need to work in sync to give the team the recognition it truly deserves.
Written by Vaibhav Tripathi. Follow Vaibhav on Twitter today.
