New Delhi: Royal Challengers Bengaluru (RCB) has shocked the fans and the cricket pundits alike with their strange strategy at the Indian Premier League (IPL) 2025 mega auction, taking place in Jeddah. During the two sets of marquee players which went under the hammer first, RCB did make bids for star players but pulled out midway, leaving the IPL fans confused over what they were exactly thinking.
It is understood that RCB retained only three players ahead of the auction – Virat Kohli, Rajat Patidar, and Yash Dayal. The team needs to build its core and needs good batters and bowlers as well. But they could only acquire the services of Liam Livingstone (from the marquee players sets) for the next three years, bagging him for Rs. 8.75 crore. They even bid for the likes of Rishabh Pant, KL Rahul, Mitchell Starc, and David Miller, but the franchise pulled out midway.
This weird strategy has irked some of the former cricketers who are criticising the franchise for being “naive” at the IPL 2025 auction. Legendary batter Kris Srikkanth blasted the franchise, calling it “naive” and “baffling”. He took to his social media handle on “X” and wrote, “Rcb needed one really good keeper batter and it would have been an ideal match to bring back Rahul into the fold that to at a steal of a price ! The strategy they have currently is baffling and quite naive to be frank!”
“As usual rcb has missed a trick in the auctions by not going hard for @klrahul ! What a steal for DC though,” he went on to add in another post.
Rcb needed one really good keeper batter and it would have been an ideal match to bring back Rahul into the fold that to at a steal of a price ! The strategy they have currently is baffling and quite naive to be frank! #IPLAuction2025
— Kris Srikkanth (@KrisSrikkanth) November 24, 2024
As usual rcb has missed a trick in the auctions by not going hard for @klrahul ! What a steal for DC though #IPLAuction2025
— Kris Srikkanth (@KrisSrikkanth) November 24, 2024
Robin Uthappa, Eoin Morgan weigh in
Speaking on JioCinema, former India player Robin Uthappa said that he isn’t able to understand the mindset of RCB as they didn’t go after the big players, despite having the second-biggest purse in the auction.
“I’m a local boy, I am confused. You’ve not made more than one pick in the first two marquee sets. When you’re trying to rebuild a side, when you’re trying to figure out in which direction you’re going to go, you have the fans backing you year in, year out. And I as a fan of RCB and as a former player of RCB, I feel like they’ve missed the trick here,” Uthappa said.
Former England skipper Eoin Morgan echoed Uthappa’s comments, saying that the franchise not going after the marquee players doesn’t make sense. Although he expressed hope that they will go after other players in the auction later.
“What Robbie has talked about, I totally agree. You can afford to do both. You can afford to splurge early, but also then keep your powder dry for later on. And you look at how they set up their leadership group, their decision makers, you’ve got Andy Flower, Mo Bobat. So there’s a huge amount of analytics that each and every team has,” Morgan said.
“And I’m getting the impression that RCB seem to find value elsewhere. They could’ve easily gone for KL. So I can’t see where their aces lie, really, in the first day or so of the auction,” he added.
Royal Challengers Bengaluru (RCB), which almost needs to build the team from scratch, looked clueless during the early moments of IPL 2025 mega auction as they missed out on key players and didn’t even raise bids for some. Cricket Sports News: Latest Cricket News, Cricket Live Score, Sports Breaking News from Sports Today
