After a disastrous campaign last year, when Bangalore resembled a Test outfit and played and strategised in a similarly dreary manner, owner Vijay Mallya made a string of changes, recruiting the South African-born England batsman Kevin Pietersen for a record fee and installing him as captain in place of the conservative Rahul Dravid.
With the sudden relocation of this year’s Indian Premier League to South Africa, the Royal Challengers Bangalore stand to be one of the main beneficiaries with their bevy of Proteas and the South African-trained Pietersen. Not only will they be aided by their experience in the local conditions, the South Africans will also have a greater liking for the grounds. Both Jacques Kallis and Dale Steyn will enjoy the increased life in the surfaces, and the Proteas will be available for the entire series. Unfortunately for Mallya, Pietersen will only be available for the earlier part of the tournament before international duties intervene.
The South African coach Ray Jennings has used his local knowledge to engineer a coup by snapping up Roelof van der Merwe. A left arm orthodox spin bowling all rounder, van der Merwe recently made his international debut against Australia. He slotted into the lower middle order, and his heavy hitting and tight bowling palpably strengthened the Proteas, while his versatility greatly expanded his team’s strategic choices. In 44 List A matches, he averages 29.96 at a strike rate of 99.75 and has taken 75 wickets at 19.78 (ER 4.40). In 13 T20 matches, he averages 26.20 (SR 138.62) with the bat and 18.50 (ER 7.50, SR 14.7). It is quite a wonder that he was overlooked by Mickey Arthur and the South African selectors until a few weeks ago, and he will surely seize Cameron White’s position in the playing XI.
Zaheer Khan has been traded to Mumbai in return for batsman Robin Uthappa, but the loss in covered in part by the availability of the world’s No. 1 ranked ODI bowler Nathan Bracken for the second half of the season, after being absent for the entirety of last season. Ross Taylor returns for a full season, accompanied by Kiwi teammate and new signing Jesse Ryder, but with the cap on foreign players and the relative conservatism of most teams, both may spend a lot of their time watching from the sidelines, at least until the departure of Pietersen.
However, a large problem remains. Under the rules of the IPL, each team can only field four foreign players and the remaining seven must be Indians. Currently, Bangalore’s domestic cohort comprises 12 players: Wasim Jaffer, Rahul Dravid, Robin Uthappa, Manish Pandey, Shreevats Goswami, Virat Kohli, Praveen Kumar, Balachandra Akhil, Pankaj Singh, Anil Kumble, Tinu Yohannan and R Vinay Kumar. While the leading teams usually have five or six players who have recently been in contention for Indian selection, Bangalore has only Kohli, Praveen and Uthappa, none of whom are established or regular internationals.
The remainder are of questionable or little value. Dravid will miss the upcoming season, ostensibly due to family reasons, while question marks remain over the other veterans. Despite his continued productivity on the domestic circuit, Jaffer has always struggled in the shorter formats and was continually tormented on the bouncier and livelier pitches of South Africa, England and Australia during his 2007 stint in the Test team. With Dravid on the outer, Jaffer’s chances of seeing action have risen and do not bode well for Bangalore. At the other end of batting order, Kumble has been out of action since a hand injury ended his Test career at the Feroz Shah Kotla. Grand warrior that he was, Kumble’s age was becoming apparent in 2008 and at times even the most persistent of players appeared to be depleted. Kumble was never an athlete and he may have even more difficulty coming to terms with the frenetic pace of the game than he did last year. He won’t be alone in that respect, as Bangalore boast one the oldest and the least agile Indian units in the competition. Uthappa and Kohli aside, the fielding is average and uninspiring, clearly the worst of the eight teams.
Bangalore can take heart from the promising form of Kohli in the last 12 months. Feted and touted as a future international start after leading India to the U-19 World Cup crown, Kohli struggled in last year’s IPL, scoring only 165 runs at 15.00. The selectors decided to fast track him into the ODI team in spite of this, and he rewarded them when he was given the opportunity to do so. Since then, he has scored a century against the Australians in Hyderabad and then topped the run scoring in the limited overs matches in the past Indian season, plundering four centuries to end with 682 runs at 75.77. Given his paltry returns last year, Kohli can only go up this time around. Also looking to press his claims for an international recall is Uthappa. After a bright start to his ODI career, Uthappa’s weaknesses were identified by opposition bowlers, and he became increasingly dependent on reverse sweeps and paddle scoops for his runs. Playing in South Africa will be a challenge to his technique, but it will be one that he has to overcome if he wants a recall to the T20 squad to defend the World Cup that he helped to win two years ago. Bangalore had the lowest run rate last season, and Uthappa and Kohli will need to fire if they are to have any chance of making the finals.
Source – livemint.com
