IPL 2022 Royal Challengers Bangalore preview: Remodeled RCB come into season with brand-new approach – Firstcricket News, Firstpost

With this 2022 Indian Premier League (IPL) season, the Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) are entering a brand new era. The franchise is now moving away from the flamboyance of AB de Villiers and firebrand leadership of Virat Kohli — two of their most effective driving forces in the previous seasons. Instead, they will now look to settle down to the calm and composed stewardship of Faf du Plessis, who is likely to inject a bit of conservativeness in their approach.

Faf du Plessis will lead Royal Challengers Bangalore in IPL 2022. Image: Twitter/RCBtweets

Sailing the RCB ship out of rough water is the primary responsibility of the former Proteas skipper, who is 37 and considered to be a stop-gap option as a captain. The retirement of de Villiers has created a big hole in their squad. On top of that, the management also could not secure the services of their trusted performers like Devdutt Parikkal, Washington Sundar and Yuzvendra Chahal. As a result the franchise will now be more dependent on young faces like Anuj Rawat, Mahipal Lomror, Aneeshwar Gautam, Shahbaz Ahmad and others.

These youngsters are certainly great investments for the future, but at this point they lack a bit of experience and in a highly competitive league like IPL, their opponents will certainly target this area of vulnerability. Nevertheless, RCB are ready to take this gamble. They want to groom these players for the future and the bulk of the responsibility of mentoring them will be on the senior pros like Kohli, du Plessis, Glenn Maxwell and Dinesh Karthik.

Strengths

Gone are those days when a RCB squad used to carry a reputation of being batting dominated. Now-a-days things have changed so drastically that their bowling attack is looked at as the primary strength. With pacers for all phases, an attacking wrist-spinner along with both types of finger-spin options, this season Bangalore’s bowling seems like a perfect T20 attack.

In Wanindu Hasaranga, many people see a Sunil Narine in the making. He is one of the finest wrist-spinner going around in world cricket and since 2021 the Sri Lankan all-rounder averages 15.3 with the ball along with a strike-rate of 14.7 in T20 cricket. In addition, the 24-year old is also a pretty handy hitter down the order. Hence, it is quite understandable why RCB paid INR 10.75 crore for him. And it is just a matter of time when Hasaranga will set the IPL ablaze.

Amongst the local spinners who will play important roles this season are experienced leggie Karn Sharma along with left-arm orthodox Shahbaz Ahmed and Mahipal Lomror.

Their pace bowling arsenal is equally impressive, if not better. The foreign trio of Josh Hazlewood, David Willey and Jason Behrendorff are attacking options with new ball as well as at the death overs. And they also have Harshal Patel and Mohammad Siraj in the scheme of things along with the likes of Siddharth Kaul and Chama Milind as backups. Overall, on pitches in Mumbai, this is certainly lethal pace attack.

Furthermore, the number of of all-rounders in the squad will give du Plessis plenty of depth in both batting and bowling.

Weaknesses

Without beating around the bush we can safely say that this season RCB’s batting lacks a bit of firepower. With de Villiers no longer there to see them through the testing phases and Kohli going through a lean patch as a batsman for a while, their batting desperately seek a bit of exuberance from the others. Also, if du Plessis open the innings alongside the former skipper, there will be a lot of pressure on the Maxwell and Karthik in the middle-order.

So can they split du Plessis and Kohli?

In this particular RCB team, Kohli will be much better suited at No.3. There is Rawat who can open the innings and take advantage of the powerplay whereas one of du Plessis and Kohli should ideally look to bat till the 15th 16th over and then Maxwell and Karthik can play their natural games.

However, at times barring Maxwell, the other senior batters of RCB tend to struggle to up the ante against spin when the field is open. In T20s Kohli’s strike-rate against slow bowling is 104.7 whereas du Plessis’ numbers hover around 110. Even Karthik averages only 15.8 against spinners since IPL 2020.

Maxwell is the only batter in this team who is most likely to take on the spinners in the middle-overs. But this sort of strategy can always be a double-edged sword.

Thankfully for RCB, at venues like Wankhede and CCI where they are playing seven out of their 14 league games, spinners are likely to be less effective. But at Pune and DY Patil stadium, the opponents will certainly pack their team with plenty of slow bowling options while challenging this RCB batting line-up.

Meanwhile, the Australian trio of Maxwell, Behrendorff and Hazlewood, will be missing at least the first three of RCB matches due to various reasons at the start of the tournament . In their absence the management will look towards Finn Allen or Sherfane Rutherford to fill those crucial overseas spots in the XI.

Season prediction

Make no mistakes, RCB’s fortunes this season will depend on how well their batters support the impressive bowling attack. Especially, they need Kohli to have a 550-600 run season. If the former skipper can fire with bat their chance of making it to their playoffs will be much more brighter compared to what it is as of now.

Royal Challengers Bangalore Squad of IPL 2022

Overseas: Faf du Plessis, Glenn Maxwell, Wanindu Hasaranga, Josh Hazlewood, Finn Allen, Sherfane Rutherford, Jason Behrendorff, David Willey

Locals: Virat Kohli, Mohammed Siraj, Harshal Patel, Dinesh Karthik (WK), Shahbaz Ahmad, Anuj Rawat (WK), Akash Deep, Mahipal Lomror, Suyash Prabhudessai, Chama Milind, Aneeshwar Gautam, Karn Sharma, Siddharth Kaul, Luvnith Sisodia

Head of cricket: Mike Hesson

Head coach: Sanjay Bangar

First-choice XI:

Faf du Plessis (Captain/Overseas), Anuj Rawat, Virat Kohli, Glenn Maxwell (Overseas), Dinesh Karthik (WK), Wanindu Hasaranga (Overseas), Shahbaz Ahmed, Karn Sharma/Mahipal Lomror, Harshal Patel, Mohammed Siraj, Josh Hazlewood (Overseas)

Read all the Latest News, Trending News, Cricket News, Bollywood News, India News and Entertainment News here. Follow us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.