Shane Watson, Yusuf Pathan, Ravindra Jadeja, Swapnil Asnodkar– these are the names of some relatively unknown players who represented a so called weak side Rajasthan Royals in the first edition of IPL in 2008. No one gave them a chance of winning the tournament ahead of strong Deccan Chargers and Chennai Super Kings. But Royals’ coach cum captain Shane Warne had other ideas. The legendary leggie carried his team all the way to the title. Since then, the Royals have maintained a low profile signings during the auctions. Last year, they had the services of some unknown rookies such as James Faulkner, Sanju Samson, Stuart Binny and Kevon Cooper. They had a pretty good IPL season as they finished at the third position after losing to eventual champions Mumbai Indians in the eliminator and finished as runners up in the Champions League T20.
So the Royals team management led by former Indian batsman Rahul Dravid decided to retain some of their key players from the last season. In the IPL player retention, they retained the maximum limit of 5 players which includes the Aussie duo of Shane Watson, James Faulkner and the Indian trio of Ajinkya Rahane, Stuart Binny and promising Sanju Samson. Now the Royals will keep it simple for the auctions as they will go for some young and talented players instead of some well established players. With the Royals spent Rs. 37.5 million in the retention, they will go into the auctions with Rs. 22.5 million. With all the eyes shifting towards the auctions, we bring you the players on whom the Royals might be tempted to go for in the auctions.
George Bailey
With the Royals’ skipper for the last edition Rahul Dravid deciding to retire from playing, the Royals are in search of a new skipper. There are talks that Shane Watson will be promoted as the captain of the team. But the team management might be interested to go in with a regular and an experienced skipper instead of an inexperienced Watson. With this criterion in mind, they might be tempted to go for George Bailey as the Aussie T20 skipper has been in a rich vein of form atleast in the shorter version of the game. When the Australian ODI side toured India, he scored over 500 runs in 6 innings which proves that he has a good record in the sub continental conditions. Bailey will be the perfect foil for their bating lineup as he has the ability to bind the top order and the middle order together.
Parveez Rasool
The Royals have retained 3 reliable seam bowling All Rounders. But their spin department is an area of concern for the Royals ahead of the auctions. Last year, they had Ajit Chandila and Ankeet Chavan to take care of the spin department. After they were banned from playing because of their role in IPL Spot Fixing scandal, 41 year old Pravin Tambe took over and shook the cricket world with some impressive performances in the Champions League T20. The Royals decided not to retain him and if they fail to use the Joker card for Tambe, it will be big headache for the Royals think-tank. In case of this scenario, Parveez Rasool will be a decent choice for the Royals. He is not only a capable bowler, but also a decent batsman who can add some depth to Royals’ batting order.
Dirk Nannes
Like the current Indian team, Rajasthan Royals too has a scrutiny of pacers who can bowl with a sheer pace consistently. They lack a bowler who can hit the deck regularly, bowl consistent line and length, control the run flow and more importantly pick up wickets at regular intervals. With a strong batting line up, Royals are losing some matches away from home due to their inexperienced bowling attack. With all these things in mind, it won’t be a bad move by the Royals to sign Australian quick Dirk Nannes. Nannes have tons of experience and has played in almost all parts of the world. He might be the go to bowler who the Royals missed in the previous editions.
In addition to these players, Royals will look to sign one or two Indian pacers among Sandeep Sharma, Umesh Yadav, Varun Aaron and the Under-19 pacer Chama Milind along with some good Middle order batsman like Eoin Morgan or JP Duminy. Apart from these players, Rajasthan Royals will look to use the Joker card for either Brad Hodge or Pravin Tambe.