IPL season 2018: Brendon McCullum has a message for his new RCB Captain
Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) assembled a terrifying batting unit as they roped in former New Zealand hard-hitter Brendon McCullum in the 2018 Indian Premier League (IPL) auction, having already retained Virat Kohli and AB de Villers for the new season. The former Kiwi skipper, who played for Gujarat Lions in last two seasons, couldn’t hold his excitement and took to Twitter to express how pleased he was with the prospect of playing with Kohli and De Villiers. Baz soon got an equally exciting reply from AB de Villiers.
Having finished IPL 10 at the bottom of the points table, the Bengaluru franchise were determined to put in a balanced squad this term, in an attempt to challenge for the title for this edition. With the likes of Kohli (17 cr), De Villiers (11 cr), McCullum (3.6 cr), Chahal (6 cr) in the squad and underperformers like Chris Gayle and Shane Watson out, there isn’t a reason why they won’t be able to do the same in IPL 11.
“Very very happy to be joining up with @RCBTweets. In @imVkohli and @ABde Villiers17, they are two blokes I have dreamed of playing with!”, tweeted McCullum, who saw his last season end prematurely for the Lions after sustaining a hamstring injury.
Very very happy to be joining up with @RCBTweets. In @imVkohli and @ABdeVilliers17, they are two blokes I have dreamed of playing with!
— Brendon McCullum (@Bazmccullum) January 28, 2018
Oh man, gonna be loads of fun! Can’t wait, Baz
— AB de Villiers (@ABdeVilliers17) January 28, 2018
RCB utilized their RTM options to buy-back highly-rated spinner Yuzvendra Chahal and all-rounder Pawan Negi and also managed to bring on board overseas stars like Quinton de Kock, Moeen Ali and Colin de Grandhomme. Here’s their full squad:
Virat Kohli (retained 17 Cr), AB de Villiers (retained 11 Cr), Sarfraz Khan (retained 3 Cr), Brendon McCullum (3.6 Cr), Chris Woakes (7.4 Cr), Colin de Grandhomme (2.2 Cr), Moeen Ali (1.7 Cr), Quinton de Kock (2.8 Cr), Umesh Yadav (4.2 Cr), Yuzvendra Chahal (6 Cr), Manan Vohra (1.1 Cr), Kulwant Kejroliya (85 Lakh), Aniket Choudhary (30 Lakh), Navdeep Saini (3 c), Murugan Ashwin (2.2 Cr), Mandeep Singh (1.4 Cr), Washington Sundar (3.2 Cr), Pawan Negi (1 Cr RTM), Mohammad Siraj (2.6 Cr), Nathan Coulter-Nile (2.2 Cr), Anirudha Joshi (20L), Parthiv Patel (1.7 Cr), Tim Southee (1 Cr), Pavan Deshpande (20 L).
Credits: Times Now