IPL 2021: Why RCB is strong favourite to win the trophy


IPL 2021: Why RCB is strong favourite to win the trophy

RCB

If you are an RCB fan in IPL 2021, this must feel like a dream – one from which you would rather not wake up. After 13 years of hurt and more hurt, the world seems very different for those in Karnataka and indeed the world over who swear by the anthem of Play Bold.

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Four wins in four games is not just well begun, these are four giant steps towards milestone number one en route to the eventual dream. RCB, technically, need to win only four more games in the remaining ten to qualify for the playoffs. Perhaps only one more to have two shots at making the final. This is uncharted territory for a franchise that has consistently flattered to deceive. Flattered less and deceived more.

However, in IPL 2021, there seems to be something different happening. Just last year, they made it to the playoffs and seemed to be building a project. They had already set forth in solving a traditional problem – the lower middle-order with all-rounders of both moulds – batsmen who bowl and bowlers who can swing their bat. And now, they look primed to take a couple of extra steps.

The cluster caravan format of the IPL is perhaps suiting them. The top two teams of last year have very exploitable problems. Mumbai Indians, with all their free-stroking players, are playing more games on slow pitches. Delhi Capitals have been ravaged by injuries and pandemic-stricken worries. Meanwhile, at RCB, some things are quietly falling into place.

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Here are the three main reasons of RCB’s early season success and why they could make a serious dash for the IPL trophy.

Mature Death Bowling

Harshal Patel RCB
Harshal Patel picked up a five-for against Mumbai Indians

It took a lot of time, years, frowning, heartbreaks, and eyebrow raising auction strategies to finally arrive at a combination that seems to be working. Funnily enough, the solution seems to be someone they have tried once, who has been with them before, gone out to different places and has come back wiser – Harshal Patel.

His re-introduction to RCB was particularly fascinating as he impressed upon arrival. He became the first bowler in all of IPL to pick up a five-for against Mumbai Indians. More than the wickets, his maturity came forth. There seems to be a calmness around Harshal Patel that was earlier missing. He has been clearly assigned a particular role and that being RCB’s finisher with the ball. It has been a historically tumultuous phase of the game for the franchise, and Harshal will require all the zen-like attributes he has hitherto shown to make sense of the madness that is the death overs in the IPL.

Referencing the game against Mumbai Indians once more, Harshal picked up four of his five wickets in the final over. That was the defining point of difference in a game that RCB won off the very last ball. He was unlucky to miss out on a hat-trick taking one extra ball to dismiss Marco Jansen after setting Krunal Pandya and Kieron Pollard with clever changes of pace.

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In fact, the bowling of RCB, overall, has been quite impressive. Mohammed Siraj is now a transformed cricketer. Apart from his wonderfully innocent and charming smile, there is very little resemblance to the man we saw in 2019. He has always bowled with a lot of heart, but now with the experience of the national team, he looks well-rounded.

Swing has long been Siraj’s ally but his penultimate over against KKR to Andre Russell – a man he has history with – was an exclamation point to his growth as a bowler in this unforgivable format.

Reliable support acts with the bat

Maxwell RCB
Glenn Maxwell is flourishing at RCB

For far too long RCB had two great batsmen and nothing much. The beginning of RCB in the IPL is almost forgotten now. It was the time of Jacques Kallis, Rahul Dravid and Kevin Pietersen. When we look back now, the first real impact we remember is from Chris Gayle. He redefined IPL batting and gave the viewers great entertainment. During his pomp, it was him and AB de Villiers. When his consistent match-winning powers began to wane, the genius of Virat Kohli began to rise. De Villiers, meanwhile, has been a constant magician for them.

The only season they had more than two batsmen firing, really, was in 2016 when they came agonisingly close to the IPL trophy. RCB had two batsmen scoring over 650 runs with Kohli scripting a record of 973 runs which will perhaps never be bettered in the IPL. But he and his team fell with the trophy within touching distance.

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In the years since, RCB have tried very hard to leverage Kohli and de Villiers as pillars around whom the batting would be shaped. However, in the words of Harsha Bhogle, they became giant trees in whose shade nothing really grew. KL Rahul, Mayank Agarwal, IPL legend Shane Watson, and young prodigy Sarfaraz Khan have all come and gone without success.

Finally, though, it seems to be falling into place. In fact, two exasperatingly curious and parallel narratives have amalgamated to provide a solution that now seems so obvious that one feels a little silly to have not seen it before. Glenn Maxwell and RCB look the perfect fit. RCB needed someone who would not be overawed by their two stalwarts and Maxwell needed the comfort of freedom.

Everywhere Maxwell has been in the IPL, the gaze has been on him to fire, and he has fizzled. At RCB, like with his national team, he is one among the rest, and like with his national team, it seems to be working just well. Moreover, they have given him a role that he has historically been successful at – building an innings with time and the knowledge of pedigreed batsmen to follow.

Then there is the case of young Devdutt Padikkal who seems to be flowering with the time afforded to him. After runs at safe pace, he is now coming into his own and scoring at a brisker rate. He is perhaps benefiting from the general stability around RCB, a luxury his predecessors were not always afforded.

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RCB finally have a calm captain

Kohli RCB IPL 2021
Virat Kohli has been exemplary in his leadership in IPL 2021

Kohli the batsman is probably the sharpest. The consistency and success with which he hares after targets is unmatched. His calculations, manipulation of the field and ability to be composed under pressure is imperious.

However, captain Kohli is quite the fiery character. That is just how he likes to play his cricket – on the edge. Remonstrating, jumping, gesticulating, and getting in on the act is his modus operandi. It works in international cricket. At RCB, it may have just been the undoing. Over the years, IPL teams have fielded plenty of uncapped players who are not elite cricketers yet. A simple case in point is Siraj from 2019 – when he was taken apart by Russell, the carnage found no consolation through his captain.

Kohli may have been the elder brother in the dressing room but on the field, in the moment, there was a sense of restlessness. That played out in team selections too. RCB used to be a very trigger-happy franchise with personnel changes being their only constant. Historically, good leaders have been known to give players enough time to succeed, or fail, before moving on to the alternative. It breeds security and enhances performance.

IPL 2021 has seen a welcome change in this regard. There seems to be a calmness in leadership, which has percolated through to the rest of the team. Every cricketer and the person aside from the athlete, matures with age and Kohli seems to be entering that phase in his captaincy, where he is more accepting of the world around him. Perhaps he realises now that not every cricketer is Virat Kohli and the barometers for judgement are subjective.

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Are the stars aligning then? If you are an RCB fan, hope is what has brought you here and hope is what will keep you going. Ee Sala cup Namde?

Also Read: Will Jofra Archer return to play the IPL?