Team: Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB)
City: Bangalore, Karnataka
Ground: M. Chinnaswamy Stadium
IPL Debut: 2008
Number of IPL Titles: 0
Who are the Royal Challengers Bangalore?
The Royal Challengers Bangalore are one of the most popular teams in the IPL. They have a huge and passionate fanbase across all of India and in particular Bangalore. The fans are very loyal and vocal in their support turning up to their home matches and being known as the “sea of read” and they are known for their chant “R-C-B”.
Despite this, their popularity has not been replicated into the success of the franchise having never won an IPL title. They have reached the playoffs 7 occasions and have been runners up on three occasions. The team has had some of the greatest T20 players of all time, like Virat Kohli, Chris Gayle, and AB de Villiers but unfortunately, they have never managed to win it. This has unfortunately led them to earning the tag as “underachievers”.
RCB were one of the founding teams of the IPL. They play their cricket at the M. Chinnaswamy Stadium which has a capacity of 35,000. The franchise is owned by United Spirits Limited, coached by Sanjay Bangar and captained by South African Faf du Plessis.
The team have built some strong rivalries with other big IPL franchises, the Kolkata Knight Riders (which started from the first ever match in the IPL) and the 4-time champions Chennai Super Kings which is called the “South Indian Derby”.
The IPL History of Royal Challengers Bangalore
As mentioned earlier, the Royal Challengers Bangalore are yet to win an IPL title, despite making it the playoffs on 4 occasions (2010, 2015, 2020, and 2021) and making it to the final on a further 3 times (2009, 2011, and 2016).
Their successful seasons in 2009, 2010 and 2011 meant they qualified for the now defunct Champions League T20 tournament. Where in 2010 they managed to reach the semi-finals and then in 2011 they went one better, reaching the final but unfortunately losing out to IPL rival, the Mumbai Indians by 31 runs.
RCB came agonisingly close to winning their two finals in 2009 and 2016. However, were closely beaten by a Hyderabad based franchise in each year. Firstly, losing to the Deccan Chargers by just 5 runs and then in 2016 losing to the Sunrisers Hyderabad by 8 runs. Following a few lean years in 2017, 2018, 2019, RCB once again qualified for the playoffs in 2020 and 2021 but are still yet to reach another final since their loss in 2016.
Who Holds the Royal Challengers Bangalore Records?
The Royal Challengers Bangalore have had some of the famous and prolific T20 and IPL batsmen the world has seen. The likes of Virat Kohli, Chris Gayle, and AB de Villiers have each accumulated some ridiculous statistics and records.
Virat Kohli, having only played for RCB since the first ever IPL, holds the record for most run for RCB and the IPL as whole, scoring 6,390 runs from 204 innings, including the most IPL half-centuries (42) and second most centuries (5).
The most centuries in the IPL (and for RCB) is only topped by Chris Gayle with 6, including the ever hundred (30 balls) and highest ever individual T20 score in the same innings of 175* versus Pune Warriors India in 2013.
Gayle sits in third place for most runs for RCB (3,163) and in between him and Kohli is South African AB de Villiers who amassed an impressive 4,491 runs for the franchise.
The bowling statistics struggle to compare with those of the batting, but the brilliant Indian leg spinner, Yuzvendra Chahal holds some mighty statistics of his own taking 139 wickets from 112 innings between 2014 and 2021 making him the highest ever wicket taker for RCB.
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