Known as the “Moneyball team“, RR were the surprise winners of the IPL in its inaugural season.
Nobody expected them to even qualify for the knock-outs, let alone win the trophy. People mocked the owners and their decision to not spend their purse on expensive players.
But the result vindicated their faith and it proved that to win a tournament you need effective impact creating match winners and not necessarily big names and big spending.
The campaign was masterminded by Shane Warne who brought out the best from all his players and channelized their energy brilliantly for the team.
It has been 12 years since and RR has failed to recreate that magic ever since. For quite some time they kept building their squad on young Indian players and lesser-known foreign players which gave them decent results but still, they had a lot of catching up to do.
Cut to the 2018 auction they threw caution to the wind and spent big money on acquisitions like Ben Stokes and Jaydev Unadkat. Unfortunately, this strategy too hasn’t paid off for them it has left their think tank muddled.
Rather than letting their best players okay at certain suitable positions, they are making their most expensive players take up the role in the hope that they repay the faith and justify their exorbitant price tag. It is a move that is affecting them severely and it is about time they simplify things else there is very little left in the race to play-offs. And that is when the actual complications begin!
