Royal Challengers Bangalore(RCB) have signed the trio of Wanindu Hasaranga, Tim David, and Dushmantha Chameera for the remainder of the IPL 2021 that is will resume from September 19th in the UAE. All three of them are yet to play an IPL game in their respective careers.
These are forced signings made by the RCB due to the withdrawal of a few of their overseas stars. The Aussie duo of Adam Zampa and Kane Richardson who left the IPL early during the Indian leg of the tournament back in April have made themselves unavailable for the 2nd half of the league as well. Daniel Sams who played a couple of games for RCB also opted out due to personal reasons. You can find the complete RCB squad here.
Scott Kuggeleijn who came in as Kane Richardson’s replacement in the fag end of 1st phase of IPL misses out this time along with Finn Allen as both of them are selected in the New Zealand squad for their upcoming tour of Bangladesh and Pakistan. This meant the only available overseas players left with RCB are Ab de Villiers, Glenn Maxwell, Dan Christian, and Kyle Jamieson.
As a result, the Virat Kohli-led team was in need of an overseas spinner and seamer. Wanindu Hasaranga, the Sri Lankan leg-spinner is a like-to-like replacement for Adam Zampa and is a much better batsman than the latter. Even in the recent T20I series, the no.2 ranked T20I bowler produced a man of the series winning performance.
Likewise, his Sri Lankan teammate and fast bowler Dushmantha Chameera has improved leaps and bounds in the last few years. He is seen as a replacement for Kane Richardson. Tim David becomes the first player from Singapore to represent an IPL team and the middle-order batsman has been part of leagues such as PSL, BBL in the past. He has found reasonable success in those and has been in tremendous form for Surrey in the Royal London One-Day Cup 2021.
Simon Katich who was the team’s head coach during the first half of the IPL has stepped down from the post and Mike Hesson takes charge. Hesson will double up as the coach to add to his duties as RCB’s Director of Cricket.
