The IPL team Royal Challengers Bangalore is one of those few teams which haven’t won the IPL title even once despite the fact that they have been playing the tournament since its inaugural edition which took place in 2008. Though RCB played finals three times yet it still failed in winning the trophy.
RCB has once again missed the chance of winning the IPL after it lost the must-win match against Gujarat Titans in the league phase in the IPL 2023 which was played at M. Chinnaswamy Stadium, Bengaluru. As per the cricket experts, the biggest reason behind RCB’s failure in winning the IPL trophy despite having a very strong team is the fact that it doesn’t focus much on its middle order and gives importance to the top three or four batters.
However, there have been times when RCB has not supported those batters who could have made a big impact and might have helped the team in winning an IPL trophy. Here is the list of such batters who should have been supported by RCB:
1. Manish Pandey:
Manish Pandey is a very famous name in the Indian cricketing circles, in 2009 while playing for the Bengaluru franchise, he became the first Indian cricketer to score a century. He played for RCB in 2009 and 2010 after which he was released by the franchise but going forward, while playing for Kolkata Knight Riders, Manish played an important role in his team’s IPL win in 2014. In 2017-18, he was one of the highest paid cricketers because of the superb knocks that he played for his franchises. Manish Pandey might have helped RCB win a title if the Bengaluru franchise had backed him.
2. Robin Uthappa:
The former Indian cricketer Robin Uthappa was pretty famous for his explosive style of batting in his playing days and he was associated with RCB in 2009 and 2010 but the IPL 2009 was a forgettable experience for him. However, he performed pretty well in 2010, he even smashed 27 sixes, the maximum by any batter in that season. Robin Uthappa’s association with RCB ended after that but he could have helped them in winning an IPL trophy.
3. Retained Sarfaraz Khan but not KL Rahul:
The Indian cricketer KL Rahul may not have been in good form for quite some time now but there was a time when he played many big knocks in the IPL but before the 2018 auction, RCB decided to retain Virat Kohli, AB de Villiers and Sarfaraz Khan but it released KL Rahul who then led Punjab Kings in the league. The Karnataka cricketer who is currently recovering from an injury is the regular skipper of IPL team Lucknow Super Giants.
4. Devdutt Padikkal:
The 22 years old cricketer Devdutt Padikkal is currently playing for Rajasthan Royals in the IPL but he made his debut for RCB in the year 2020 and performed so well that he was awarded with the Emerging Player Award. In 2021 also, he played some good knocks including the century against RR but when everyone thought that he was going to be an integral part of the RCB camp, the franchise not only released him ahead of the IPL 2022 auctions but also didn’t try much for him during the auctions.
Do you think that there is any other player who could have made RCB win the trophy? Share with us.