Last Updated on 5 years by Charbel Coorey
Why has RCB Struggled for Success in the IPL? | RCB Analysis | Why have Royal Challengers Bangalore Struggled? | When will RCB win the IPL?
Royal Challengers Bangalore, a star-studded team from the first season of the IPL, have always looked the goods. One of the strongest teams on paper after every auction, most experts, before the start of a season, predict them to lift the cup.
But, all the predictions fail more often than not. An incredible team on paper, consisting of Virat Kohli, AB de Villiers, Chris Gayle (for most of his IPL career), and many more international and domestic stars, has struggled for success in the IPL. By success, we don’t only mean winning the title; they have not performed as well as they’ve liked to and according to their potential.
This chart will help you understand this better:

RCB has played the second-most number of matches in the history of the IPL, after Mumbai Indians. However, they are the sixth-most successful team in terms of winning matches among active teams in the league. They have qualified for the playoffs only five times in 12 attempts, which includes the three Finals (2009, 2011 & 2016).
The Bangalore-based franchise has not been as successful as many believe they should. Wondering why? So are we. Let’s try and find the answers to this question.
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The Management
The biggest reason why RCB has struggled for success is their management. The management has performed very poorly in all the 12 seasons and is the reason that a team full of T20 superstars of the cricketing world is one of the most underperforming sides in the tournament.
Let’s get deep into this and talk about the areas where they’ve lacked compared to the successful teams.

Poor on the Auction Table
Royal Challengers Bangalore has a very explosive batting line-up – arguably the best top order in the league.
But it’s not the same case with their bowling department. They are over-dependent on their batting to win them games; automatically not a good sign for any team when your bowling can’t win you games.

This chart represents the economy rates of all the teams in the league. It shows that RCB is ranked seventh among the active eight teams, only better than Kings XI Punjab.

This chart indicates the economy rates in the last four overs of an innings. It reflects that RCB concedes the most runs in the last four overs among active teams, showing that bowling is their weak link, particularly at the death.
But, instead of picking good death bowlers, they are always found bidding for batters on the auction table. As a result, they often don’t have enough purse remaining to bid on quality bowlers, which means they don’t have any other option than going with their inexperienced domestic bowling attack.
Crucially, RCB has a tendency to go for the big names in auction rather than going for players they need. This has proved to be very costly throughout the 12 seasons of the league, reflective in their underwhelming record. They need to fix this.

Releasing Important Players
Royal Challengers Bangalore over the years have regretted releasing some of the superstars of T20 cricket. Players like Chris Gayle, KL Rahul, Robin Uthappa, Quinton de Kock, and many more were once part of their squad, but were released either after a bad phase or some even without getting enough games.
Chris Gayle was released after a couple of bad seasons. He came back to form. Sarafarz Khan was retained over KL Rahul. It proved to be a very very costly mistake. In the next season, Sarafarz was also released.
Releasing such big players is not a wise decision and it causes few problems for the team and we’ll talk about one of them next.
Absence of a Strong Core of Players
RCB lacks a strong core of players in their side. If you look at most successful teams like CSK and MI, they have a strong core of Indian players mixed with 2-3 overseas stars. In contrast, RCB has only Virat Kohli, AB de Villiers and Yuzvendra Chahal as their core players.
This again is the management’s fault. In 2015, they had Chris Gayle, Virat Kohli, AB de Villiers, Dinesh Karthik, Mitchell Starc, and Yuzvendra Chahal, which represents one of the strongest cores in the league. If they maintained this set of players, they would surely be the team to beat in future seasons.
However, they released most of the players who could’ve been their potential core. Worse, it seems as they are still not interested in building the core of their team. This is one major reason why they’ve struggled as a franchise.
Mismanagement of Players
This is the biggest problem of RCB. They don’t manage the players well and by managing, we mean that they don’t use the players well.
The biggest example is Shane Watson, who has become an integral part of the CSK squad; one of their most important players. Before getting picked by CSK, he was at RCB.

Watson, who has opened nearly his whole career, was batting at number six for RCB. Also, he was bowling in the death overs. Surprise, surprise, he didn’t perform as expected, and instead of RCB changing his role in the team to suit his strengths, he was released.
Another example is Shimron Hetmyer. The young gun from Windies was picked by RCB in 2019 for 4.2 Crore Rupees. After struggling in the first four games, he was benched until RCB’s last game of the season, where scored 75 runs off 47 balls. It wasn’t good enough for RCB, though, with Hetmyer released by the franchise.
One of the biggest flaws of RCB management is that they try to shape players into roles according what they desire, rather than maximising the strength of the player. One example is the decision to bowl Shane Watson and Corey Anderson in the death overs, rather than picking good death bowlers. RCB did this so they can accomodate expensive, big name top order batsmen.
These are areas where RCB management has been poor and should improve.
Over-Dependency on Virat, AB, and Chahal
Most of the time, RCB depends on skipper Virat Kohli and AB de Villiers to score the runs and then Yuzvendra Chahal to defend them. If they fail, they lose. They are over-dependent on these players for getting them over the line.

They have some other players in the batting department but the bowling is mostly dependent on Chahal. Even if he picks 2-3 wickets and stops the flow of runs, their death bowling balances things out. They need to find good players to accompany these players in the squad.
This shows the importance of a strong core which, again, they lack.
Need to Back their Players
Virat Kohli in someway hasn’t been upto the mark on the tactical front. He is known for chopping the playing XI after every defeat and doesn’t back his players after few bad performances.
Successful teams like MI and CSK back their players until they perform. Shane Watson is the best example. He was struggling to score runs but MS Dhoni and CSK backed him and he scored a hundred in the 2018 Final and almost took them over the line in the 2019 Final.
This is not the case with RCB. As mentioned above, a player like Hetmyer was dropped after a few bad games and got a chance finally after eight games. Eventually, he was released before the next auction, much like Watson was released before him after misusing the all-rounder.
RCB’s players are always under pressure and have a fear of getting dropped after a bad game. It is very difficult to play your natural game under that kind of environment. Virat Kohli should back his players to do well even if they are having a bad phase. Also, Virat Kohli makes some tactical errors, especially under crunch situations, so he also needs to analyse things better.
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So, the biggest reason for RCB’s struggle in the league is poor decision making; a real flop show by their management. They need to start from the auction table, plan better, and pick the players according to their strengths. Then, it is vital they manage them well and back them in their bad phases.
Overall, RCB has what it takes to be a champion side. RCB fans hope that the Virat Kohli-led side will perform to their potential and provide some cracking on-field action that translates into tangible results.
Thanks for reading!
Written by Robin Rounder. Follow Robin on Twitter today.
Check out more of Robin’s articles on CricBlog, including:
- Analysis of England’s white-ball rise since 2015. What has been the key?
- 4 reasons why Mumbai Indians edge CSK in IPL cricket
- 3 key tips and tricks to win in Dream11 Grand League
- Why West Indies are successful in World T20s: Will they win the next edition too?
- Pros and cons of the rise of T20 cricket
Also, CricBlog is now on YouTube: Check out some of the things Indian Cricket Fans never say!
Subscribe to CricBlog TV today!
Great one,Robbie🔥