It’s the time of the Indian Premier League (IPL). Every year, as the IPL commences, people in Bangalore wonder whether Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) will win this time around.
RCB fans come with a lot of enthusiasm and big hopes – theirs should, by all means, be a dominant team considering it has lots of big names. But when these big names fail to deliver, the enthusiasm of the fans turns into tears.
As an RCB fan, the repeated failure of RCB is quite painful to watch. Gradually, as seasons passed, people labelled them ‘chokers’ because it was a team with lots of big-name players but they weren’t able to perform. Many RCB fans have tried to find the reason behind the team’s losses.
I have my own ideas as to why the team struggles so much and hasn’t been able to win the trophy even once. Let’s take a look at them.
1. Absence Of Average But Solid And Dependable Players
This is one of the main reasons behind the team’s failures. The team has always had big names like Rahul Dravid, Anil Kumble, Dale Steyn, Chris Gayle, Virat Kohli, AB de Villiers and more along with some of the worst performers. When these big names have a bad day, the entire team collapses. The team needs players who may not be exceptional but are solid and dependable. We rarely find great teamwork from the team. This lack of teamwork has been a major reason behind the team’s losses.
2. Poor Bowling Attack
As we all know, in T20s, teams with bowlers who can make an impact have more of a chance to prevail over their opponents. And RCB has lacked a reliable bowling attack. But I feel the team’s bowling has been gradually improving over the seasons. When a world class bowler like Daniel Vettori is their bowling coach, they should have a much stronger bowling side. The team management should focus more on bowling.
3. Failure Of Domestic Players
In the IPL, every team generally has 4-5 domestic players. Ultimately, a team’s performance depends on the performance of domestic talent. But in the case of RCB, I have observed that most of the domestic players performed quite poorly. No one had expected Rajasthan Royals to win the 2008 IPL because they didn’t have more than 2-3 world class players in their line up but they were able to do so due to an outstanding performance from their domestic players. RCB should try and be more careful when selecting domestic players during auctions.
Many critics try and blame the captain for the team’s losses but I don’t think that’s quite right in this case. If RCB improves in the above-mentioned sections, then the day won’t be far when they will be able to bring home the IPL trophy.