RCB head coach Andy Flower looks to rope in 'highly skillful and intelligent' bowlers for M Chinnaswamy

Royal Challengers Bengaluru’s (RCB’s) head coach Andy Flower has mentioned that his side needs more “skilful and intelligent” bowlers while operating at the M Chinnaswamy Stadium.

Flower opined that “pace is not going to be the answer” at the high-scoring venue and RCB require “bowlers that can bowl to really specific plans at Chinnaswamy”.

“As far as recruitment for next year, it’s a bit early to talk about that. Quite frankly, I don’t want to talk about that yet. I do think though the Chinnaswamy has some particular qualities that we need to be able to exploit,” said Flower during the post-match presentation after the loss to Rajasthan Royals in the Eliminator. 

“You certainly need highly skilful bowlers at Chinnaswamy. Simply pace is not going to be the answer there. You need skilful, intelligent bowlers and people that can bowl to really specific plans at Chinnaswamy.”

IPL 2024 has witnessed many batting records getting reduced to dust and batters dominate the bowlers like no other season. Taking that into consideration, Flower mentioned that there is a need to recruit batters who can bat at a high tempo throughout the innings.

“And I think we’ve all seen how the power game has affected T20 cricket recently. So on the batting front, you certainly need to recruit batsmen with that sort of power that can keep up that sort of tempo.”

RCB’s IPL 2024 campaign came to a halt after they suffered a four-wicket loss at the hands of Rajasthan Royals (RR) in the Eliminator on Wednesday (May 22). But the Faf du Plessis-led side scripted a dramatic turnaround in fortunes to win six games in a row and secure a last-minute berth in the playoffs. 

Their head coach lauded their fightback and lavished praise on Faf and Virat Kohli for leading by example on the field.

“I think our guys have fought brilliantly over the last 10 weeks to come back from our first half of the tournament was a great effort and I certainly would pay tribute to Faf du Plessis for his captaincy and Faf and Virat for the way they’ve led from the front as role models and professional sports people. But also the way they’ve played. They both really been great role models for everyone else and the rest of the boys fought really hard to get us back into the tournament,” mentioned Flower.