Former India batter Robin Uthappa believes Rajat Patidar will lean on leadership skills of Virat Kohli and would have to contend with the batting stalwart’s superstardom while leading the Royal Challengers Bengaluru (RCB) in IPL 2025. This will be Patidar’s first time leading an IPL team, and his previous leadership experience has been leading Madhya Pradesh to the final of the 2024/25 Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy. Apart from Patidar, Axar Patel will also be in the spotlight as he leads Delhi Capitals in a full-time capacity for the first time in the IPL.
“Between Axar Patel and Rajat Patidar, I think Axar will be in a little bit better stead, to be very honest, because even with the newish side, there’s still a lot of familiar faces. With Rajat also, it’s a similar situation, but Rajat will have to contend with the superstardom of Virat Kohli, which is there within that side. He will, I think, lean on Virat Kohli’s captaincy skills a lot.
“But I think Rajat is in a unique position to be able to take RCB forward. I’m really excited for teams like RCB, KKR (who have Ajinkya Rahane) and Delhi simply because they have new captains and it presents a new opportunity for these new captains to take the legacy of each team forward.
“In RCB’s case, I think in RCB with Rajat being there at the helm right now, he will have to figure out his mode of leadership. He has done fairly well with leadership in domestic cricket. But he’ll have to convert that obviously again into performances as far as RCB is concerned,” said Uthappa, an IPL expert for JioStar, to IANS in a virtual interaction prior to the 18th edition of the tournament.
RCB also have a new-ish fast bowling look with Bhuvneshwar Kumar and Rasikh Salam coming in alongside the retained Yash Dayal and Josh Hazlewood, as well as Lungi Ngidi and Nuwan Thushara joining in.
Uthappa, who previously won the IPL with Chennai Super Kings and Kolkata Knight Riders, feels Axar and Patidar need to devise a way for finding success in at their home venues, especially with the M Chinnaswamy Stadium traditionally aiding batters big time.
“The challenges would be in home conditions – like how do you win in home conditions, especially both in these similar venues like Delhi and Bengaluru – small, high-scoring grounds, no real home advantage. So they’ll have to figure out a solution for that as leaders. For me, I think that would be one of the biggest challenges that they would face.
“Any team playing against RCB at Bengaluru is going to do a lot of heavy lifting because they are playing in a venue, which is not an easy venue to bowl and defend. So it’s going to be a lot of hard work for the bowlers. But I think they have the right personnel for those conditions in Bhubaneswar Kumar, Josh Hazlewood, Yash Dayal, and Rasikh Dar, if I’m not wrong.
“They have some decent, very, very decent fast bowlers. So, I think they have the personnel to do the job. One would only hope that there aren’t any injuries so that they can remain fit and healthy through the whole season, so that their fast bowling department stays strong for them through the course of the season.
“Outside of Bangalore, I think they’ll have a relatively easier job. But at Bangalore is where they will have to do the heavy lifting, and I think any team bowling there has to do a lot of heavy lifting,” he elaborated.
Uthappa signed off by saying DC need to have KL Rahul opening the batting, citing his skills to take the bowlers to cleaners when on song. Apart from Rahul, DC have vice-captain Faf du Plessis and Jake Fraser-McGurk as opening options.
“In my opinion, if DC use him anywhere else other than the top, they will be doing a disservice to themselves and to KL Rahul. He should open the batting in T20 cricket because I think there are very few players in the world who are as good and as destructive as he can be when he is batting against a new ball.”
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
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