IPL 2022: Senior India off-spinner Ravichandran Ashwin, who will turn up for his new franchise Rajasthan Royals in this year’s IPL, has put out an interesting thought regarding the captaincy of Virat Kohli at Royal Challengers Bangalore.
Ashwin believes that Virat Kohli might be reinstated as RCB’s captain from next season. RCB will be led by Faf du Plessis in IPL 2022, the South African taking over the duties from Kohli who had relinquished his post last season as RCB once again failed to get their hands on the coveted IPL trophy.
Kohli had last year quit RCB and India’s T20I captaincy citing the need to lessen his burden. RCB bought Faf for 7 crore in the mega-auction last month and named him their new captain for this season over the likes of Glenn Maxwell and Dinesh Karthik.
Speaking on his YouTube channel, Ravichandran Ashwin pondered whether the decision to have 37-year-old du Plessis as RCB’s captain is for this season only; the off-spinner reckons that Kohli will get his much-deserved break from captaincy this year and may take the leadership role again from next onwards.
“Faf is more like towards the end of his IPL career. He probably has one-year two-three years left in him. And they have made him the captain, which is quite a good decision. He brings a lot of experience,” Ravichandran Ashwin said in his YouTube video.
“I feel that since Virat Kohli has undergone a lot of stress as a captain in the last few years, this year will be like a break for him and they might appoint him the captain next year, is my guess. I don’t know whether this decision (appointment of Faf as RCB captain) is futuristic or will it just be a one-year stopgap decision.”
The IPL 2022 kicks off on March 26 with CSK taking on KKR at the Wankhede. RCB will play their first game on March 27 against Punjab Kings at the DY Patil Stadium.
