Ashish Nehra Underlines Where The Problem Lies With Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB)

Former bowling coach of Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) Ashish Nehra has opened up on the franchise after they were unsuccessful this year too in capturing the title. The Royal Challengers saw their IPL 2020 campaign come to a close after their defeat to SunRisers Hyderabad in the Eliminator in Abu Dhabi. Ashish Nehra lamented the team’s over-reliance on Virat Kohli and AB De Villiers.

Virat Kohli and AB De Villiers have been the mainstay of RCB for plenty of years now. Virat Kohli and AB De Villiers did their absolute best even in IPL 2020 while Devdutt Padikkal was yet another standout player this year. However, the responsibility of playing the big shots in the slog overs cost them most of their games. The performances of Kohli and De Villiers were also inconsistent as the franchise ended their leg with five successive losses.

Ashish Nehra mentioned that the franchise are overly dependent on Virat Kohli and AB De Villiers while the team constitutes of 11 players. The former left-arm seamer feels that RCB are like Kings XI Punjab and that any side should have at least five players to look up to.

“RCB are overly dependent on Virat Kohli and AB de Villiers. The entire team and the squad revolves around them which is not the right thinking as it is a game of 11 players. You should have at least 5 players, you can look at any other franchise, Kings XI Punjab also have similar problems where they don’t have these two as well as they make even more changes. You need to keep 4-5 players with you,” Nehra stated as quoted by Hindustan Times.

“Last year they had Hetmyer, Marcus Stoinis” : Ashish Nehra

Ashish Nehra felt uncertain about opening batsman Aaron Finch being there with the team for IPL 2021. The 41-year old underlined that the Royal Challengers must have at least two to three reliable players other than Yuzvendra Chahal, Kohli, and De Villiers, reminding them they had Marcus Stoinis and Shimron Hetmyer last year.

“It will be interesting to see if Aaron Finch will be there with the team next year. These difficulties have been there. Last year they had Hetmyer, Marcus Stoinis. You should let the same players be with you for 2-3 years other than those two. These two players and Chahal are always there in RCB. Apart from them, you will not see a fourth name,” he added.

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