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Indian Premier League - IPL
January 12, 2025 - 8:56 am

RCB in IPL 2025: 3 Factors That Could Decide Their Fate This Season

RCB have come close many times but faltered at crucial moments, leading to unwanted results all these years.

Royal Challengers Bengaluru (RCB) assembled a quality squad by buying several top-class players during the IPL 2025 auction. They were prudent with their players’ selection and nailed them in an otherwise fickle event.

However, they have had quality squads even in the past but haven’t won that elusive trophy yet. RCB have come close many times but faltered at crucial moments, leading to unwanted results all these years.

ALSO READ: India Squad for England T20Is Named: T20 World Cup Star Promoted As Vice-Captain

We look at three factors that could decide RCB’s performance in IPL 2025.

Virat Kohli’s form at the top crucial for RCB

RCB’s batting has revolved around Virat Kohli all these years, especially after Chris Gayle and AB de Villiers’ departure. He is supremely consistent and performances have hardly gone down. He was the leading run-scorer last season, accumulating 741 runs at an average of 61.75 and a strike rate of 154.69 in 15 innings, including five fifties and a century.

However, his recent improvements in scoring rate have made his runs more valuable than ever, for Kohli no longer adopts a traditional approach and goes hard from the first ball. His powerplay strike rate in the 2024 season was a whopping 161.47, a massive improvement from the previous two seasons (136.81 in 2023 and 116.78 in 2022). His strike rate in the first ten balls was 160.95 last season, quite higher than the previous two editions (126.05 in 2023 and 128.97 in 2022).

Even his spin game saw a significant rise, for Kohli was no longer restricted by them. He struck at 137.08 and found the fence every 6.65 deliveries vs spin in 2024. The same numbers were 113.46 and 9.90 in 2023 and 108.08 and 12.37 in 2022 against slow bowlers.

Also Read: Strongest Rajasthan Royals (RR) Bowling Attack For IPL 2025 Revealed

Filling the DK-sized finishing role with Tim David

Dinesh Karthik nailed his role of finishing the innings beautifully in the previous cycle, providing impetus to the innings in death overs. RCB have bought a few strong options to replace him, including Tim David. While David has a solid track record in other T20 leagues, he didn’t create the same impact in the IPL, even if he did well in patches.

The overall numbers look good, but his inconsistency has been a major issue. Further, teams have confined him with hard lengths at pace and spinners. He has an average of 15.33 and a strike rate of 108.23 vs spin, and teams are smart enough to use more slow bowlers against him.

Jitesh Sharma, who might partner with him in the lower order, also has hard lengths and express pace issues. He had a strike rate of 121.51 and took 7.18 deliveries for every boundary vs pace last season. Jitesh might not be the best fit for finishing duties and would be more suited in the middle order.

Dinesh Karthik nailed this role perfectly. He could thwack all lengths vs pace and hit boundaries consistently in death overs. David and others will have their task cut out to fill big shoes next season.

How Bhuvneshwar Kumar leads the new-look RCB bowling attack

RCB have bought Bhuvneshwar Kumar with high expectations, and he will lead the pace attack next season. While he is an elite operator, it remains to be seen whether he can continue the same in a fresh season. Bhuvneshwar doesn’t play at this level consistently, even though he is active in local and domestic tournaments.

The signs of regression were visible last season, where he had a higher economy rate (9.35) than any other IPL edition. His average (48.45) and strike rate (31) were the second-worst, only better than the 2021 season. He didn’t get much movement with the new ball, and his powerplay (8.18) and death overs (13.55) economy rate were at an all-time high.

Among all the bowlers with at least ten death overs, his economy rate was the worst and balls-per-boundary (3.30) was the second-worst. However, Bhuvneshwar played in the Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy recently, where he took 11 wickets at 16 runs apiece, conceding only 6.03 runs per over. With the run rates soaring like never before, he would need to up his game if RCB are to do well next season.

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