Royal Challengers Bangalore, one of the most expensive and strongest squad on paper every year. But on a practical implementation, they always mess up the things disappointing their fans.
Three-time finalists in the last ten seasons, they haven”t managed to win the trophy even once and this left a huge void in the squad that includes the likes of Indian skipper Virat Kohli and the ever awesomatic “Benjamin De Villiers”. So what went wrong with RCB this season???
Let”s now list the top five reasons that resulted in a severe heartbreak for the camp and the fans:
1. Poor decisions by RCB management
It all started when everyone wondered why Sarfaraz Khan was preferred over KL Rahul or any other batsman for retention!! The end result being Sarfaraz failing to make into the playing XI due to his awful performances.
The management was so clueless as they were struggling to use even the RTM properly in the auction time. Though Chahal was retained, another call on RTM could have been choosing wisely and this surely cost the management.
Rahul, Gayle and Shane Watson are performing exceptionally well for their respective franchises this season and this decision surely frustrated the fans.
2. Over dependent on Kohli and AB
While lack of Gayle left a huge void in the batting line up, the team seemed to have dropped the entire responsibility on the shoulders of Virat and AB de Villiers.
The duo scored 682 runs and this replicated the over dependency on the star players. Though Mccullum and De Kock contributed, it was pretty evident that lack of this star duo would drop the team in tatters.
Barring Mandeep Singh, none of the middle order batsmen was able to exhibit their batting prowess and this has certainly let them down this season.
AB clinched the Man of the match award twice out of the three RCB wins. Pretty sums up his criticality at Number 3.
3. Fielding
“Catches win matches” and this statement obviously makes sense for the fielders. Lots of dropped catches costed the game for them and eventually found it difficult to make it to the top four in the table.
Even after their match against KKR at Bengaluru Mccullum mentioned that their fielding was at their worst and they needed to improve. Several misfields and overthrows made the things worse for them.
4. Bowling
While Kohli mentioned the present squad is the most balanced side over the years in terms of all the departments, the bowlers proved him wrong.
Inability to defend high scores and a lot of extras added vows to the squad and they couldn”t correct their mistakes. The camp has failed to maintain a standard bowling lineup throughout the season. Corey Anderson and Chris woakes went for a truckload of runs as the opposition smashed them to all corners.
Siraj and Umesh had a mixed tournament as they exhibited their skills in few matches but couldn”t be consistent in their line and lengths. The inclusion of Tim Southee made a difference but it was too late for them to correct their errors.
5. Lack of Chahal”s lucky charm
Chahal wasn”t able to do the work he used to do for Royals for the past four years. Though he had taken 70 wickets in the past, he picked only eight wickets this season and failed to be the frontline spinner for the team.
Negi and Washington Sundar in their chances weren”t able to bowl in tandem with Chahal and the spin department couldn”t even to register thrifty spells.