Rajasthan aim for big things with their most exciting squad as yet

Best finish: Champions in 2008
Worst finish: Last spot in 2020
IPL 2020 finish: Last spot
Top Run-Getter: Sanju Samson - 1,907
Top Wicket-Taker: Jofra Archer - 46
New additions: Chris Morris, Shivam Dube, Chetan Sakaria, Liam Livingstone, Mustafizur Rahman, K.C Cariappa, Kuldip Yadav, Akash Singh

Rajasthan Royals were arguably the best side in the 2021 auction. Amongst the three franchises that went in with more than INR 20 crore to spend, only RR seemed to aptly address issues that held them back last season. 

The tough call to release Steve Smith provided them a hefty budget for the auction as well as a spot for an overseas player in XI. They shed their ‘Moneyball team’ image in the auction to give that spot to Chris Morris (in all probability), splurging INR 16.25 crore on him - the most spent on a signing in the tournament’s history. 

Some other such bids indicated RR’s eagerness to improve this season after finishing with the wooden spoon in 2020. The conflation of intent with a judicious approach in the auction have seen RR build their strongest squad in a while. Jofra Archer’s injury though remains a major talking point from their camp.

Strengths

There have been enough instances of teams slowing down against spin. That is not the case with RR. At a strike rate of 136.6, they were severe against spinners, more than any other side. 

One can say that the numbers are skewed by their two great performances in Sharjah but even outside, they had the best run-rate against spin (7.9), only the margin gets narrower. The credit for these numbers goes to their star batting trio - Sanju Samson, Jos Buttler and Ben Stokes. Samson, in particular, has the third-highest strike rate against spinners (160.2) by any Indian batsman since 2020 (minimum 150 T20 runs).

Besides, RR’s greatest strength since their comeback in 2018 has been a contingent of players who can single-handedly pull games towards their side. Samson, Buttler, Stokes, Archer and now Morris outnumber the list of such players in other teams.

Weakness

RR suffered a horror season with the ball in 2020. While Jofra Archer won the Most Valuable Player of the Season award, picking 20 wickets at excellent numbers, the rest of the bowling line-up just didn’t show up. Hence, RR were the most expensive side in two of the three phases of bowling - Powerplay (8.3) and death overs (11.6). 

In addition, they don’t have any variety in their spin attack. Leg-spinners are recommended for every T20 side but that is the only flavour that RR’s spin unit offers. They have no specialist finger spinners - neither left-arm or right-arm. Talking on match-up terms, they will always start on the backfoot against the left-handed batsmen.

On top of that, the leader of the leg-spin attack, Shreyas Gopal had a forgettable IPL 2020 - five wickets in 14 games alongside going at 8.5 runs per over. 

Opportunities

RR took a giant step ahead in mending their bowling by signing Morris. Archer was brilliant with the new ball but seemed flustered at the death (economy 9.5,  average 33.8) in IPL 2020. Morris, on the other hand, bowled with a miserly economy of 7.7 at the death last year, taking a wicket every 10.3 runs.

Morris perfectly fills in for the only role Archer couldn’t nail last year. With the two bowling in tandem, taking runs off RR won’t be as easy as it was last year. However, a finger injury will bereave RR of Archer’s services in the first half of the season. RR deepened their bowling resources by adding Mustafizur Rahman and with AJ Tye already in the ranks, Morris should find enough support. 

Although, bowling isn’t the only front where Morris can accompany Archer. Archer had the second-highest batting strike rate last IPL (179.4) and Morris is himself a belligerent hitter on his day. You add Shivam Dube, their new recruit to the list, and there is a lower order that can produce runs at a high strike rate, even if they come at a sub-par average. 

Threats

While the lower-order promises a ‘high-risk high return’ approach, the experience in RR’s batting falls off the cliff post number four. The likes of Riyan Parag, Rahul Tewatia, and Dube have shown glimpses of their batting prowess but none guarantee enough runs at crucial spots in the middle-order. Parag, in fact, averaged only 12.2 last IPL season. 

Thus, RR become a top-heavy side - a batting configuration that has not always worked in IPL before. This inexperience in the middle is why we might not see Buttler and Stokes open. Rather, one of them will bat at four to be the flag-bearer of the middle-order. 

This situation opens up another area of vulnerability - the opening partner for Buttler/Stokes. Their current Indian options lie in Yashasvi Jaiswal and Manan Vohra. Jaiswal seemed uncooked for IPL cricket last season and Vohra has surprisingly spent the past two seasons on the bench. It will be interesting to see how these little things work out for RR this season. 

They can fix this by including Liam Livingstone or David Miller in the XI but that can leave them unguarded in the pace department. 

Probable XI

Ben Stokes, Yashasvi Jaiswal/Manan Vohra, Sanju Samson (c/wk), Jos Buttler, Riyan Parag, Rahul Tewatia, Shivam Dube, Chris Morris, Shreyas Gopal, Mustafizur Rahman*, Kartik Tyagi

*Archer replaces Rahman in the XI when available