IPL 2021: Royal Challengers Bangalore’s predicted playing XI
Royal Challengers Bangalore are one of the three teams in the cash-rich IPL who are yet to get hold of the coveted IPL title. They have had three opportunities to make a name for themselves but they let go of the opportunity in all three finals. RCB made it to the final in the IPL 2009 season where they succumbed to a defeat at the hands of Deccan Chargers Hyderabad (now defunct franchise).
After that, they made it to the final in the 2011 season where they were defeated by Chennai Super Kings. After going through a series of failures, they once again made it to the final in the IPL 2016 season. This was also Virat Kohli’s first IPL final as captain. He scored a record 973 runs in that season including 4 centuries and 7 half-centuries.
RCB captain won the orange cap but unfortunately, they failed to pull off the ropes in the final. David Warner’s Sunrisers Hyderabad had better ideas and gameplan as they defeated Virat Kohli’s RCB to win their maiden IPL title.
RCB will begin their new IPL journey on April 9 where they will play against Rohit Sharma’s Mumbai Indians in the tournament opener at the MA Chidambaram Stadium in Chennai. They did a cleaning process by releasing 10 players but at the same time retaining the core part of the squad.
In this article, we will take a look at the predicted playing XI of Royal Challengers Bangalore:
1. Devdutt Padikkal
Devudutt Padikkal was brought in by Royal Challengers Bangalore for INR 20 lakh in the 2020 IPL auction. The youngster justified his selection right by performing really well in the 2020 edition of the Indian Premier League.
As an opener, he provided a blistering start to the game. So, it’s no doubt that he will be opening the innings this time also. The 20-year-old young opener topped the run-charts for RCB in the last season. He was the only consistent run-scorer with the bat.
The youngster exhibited batting prowess against top teams and mounted pressure by scoring sixes and fours at will. The Karnataka batsman managed to score as many as 473 runs in a total of 15 games. He smashed as many as 5 fifties to his name.
