Zubin Bharucha, the Head of Cricket Operations of Rajasthan Royals, has said the team would miss Steven Smith in the IPL.
He also confirmed the franchise had replaced Smith with South Africa batsman, Heinrich Klaasen,
“Obviously we miss stature of a player like Smith and the quality he brings but as a team, we are absolutely prepared, and we obviously got his replacement as Heinrich Klaasen. So, strategically there has been no change,” Bharucha said.
“When we go to auction, we always look for backups. There are certain players like all-rounders, who you don’t have many, that person you will miss, but we have dozens of quality batsman in India. So we will not miss anybody,” he added.
Smith was withdrawn by BCCI after Cricket Australia banned him for one year over the Sandpaper Gate. He was the only player to be retained by the franchise ahead of IPL auction and was handed captaincy as well.
However, ‘Sandpaper Gate’ that took place during the third Test between Australia and South Africa resulted in him getting banned.
He had already left the captaincy post before facing the IPL 2018: We Will Miss Steven Smith – Rajasthan Royals ban.
Not just Smith, David Warner, the captain of Sunrisers Hyderabad was also withdrawn from the IPL.
While Rajasthan Royals replaced Smith with Ajinkya Rahane as captain, Kane Williamson was stepped in to replace Warner as SRH’s skipper.
SRH also appointed Bhuvneshwar Kumar as vice-captain and even roped in Alex Hales to replace Warner in the team.
Both, Rajasthan Royals and Sunrisers Hyderabad, face each other in their opening encounter on April 9 in Hyderabad.
Rajasthan Royals are making a comeback in IPL after serving a ban for two years. Just like SRH, Rajasthan Royals have clinched IPL title once and is in search of the second title.
Though, both the teams have got weakened by the withdrawal of their captains – who were also their key players.
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