N Jagadeesan, Vishnu Vinod in line to replace KL Rahul in RCB camp

The Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) camp has been dented early even before the start of their IPL 10 campaign. Their skipper Virat Kohli is expected to be out of action for a brief while due to a shoulder injury. Also, there are dark clouds over the participation of AB de Villiers in the first few fixtures after the South African recently pulled out of the finals of the Momentum One Day Cup – the 50 over domestic competition of South Africa. Another injury blow came in the form of KL Rahul.

The stylish Indian opener has been ruled out of the entire season of the IPL 2017 and is expected to undergo a surgery soon. The RCB camp have a big task at hand to find replacement for KL Rahul. They started the hunt for the replacement and recently had their trials conducted. The overseas bowlers of the team sweated it out in the nets as they looked for a batsman replacement for Rahul. Adam Milne, Shane Watson and Tymal Mills were the ones bowling to these batsmen along with the net bowlers.

Among the forerunners for the replacement, four names stood out. They were – Karnataka’s in-form batsman Pavan Deshpande, Tamil Nadu’s N Jagadeesan, Kerala’s Vishnu Vinod and Himachal Pradesh’ Prashant Chopra. Deshpande has had an impressive domestic season  this year and he took special liking for Tymal Mills at the trials as he put on some good display of power hitting. Prashant Chopra has been a heavy run getter in the domestic circuit and was the leading performer for his state team this year. He is an occasional wicket keeper too, just like KL Rahul.

However, what might work out in the favor of the other two players – N Jagadeesan and Vishnu Vinod – is the fact that they are regular wicket keepers. Hence, they are being tipped to be leading the race at the moment. The trials took place under the watchful eyes of RCB head coach Daniel Vettori. In any case, the Royal Challengers Bangalore camp already boasts of Maharashtra wicket keeper Kedar Jadhav. However, the fact that Jadhav has not been donning the wicket keeping gloves in the recent past might enforce the camp to rope in another wicket keeper.