Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) has been one of the most loved teams ever since the inception of the Indian Premier League (IPL). They’ve never fallen short of star players but still, never managed to lift the coveted trophy even as they aim to do the same in yet another season. The franchise has once again bagged some star cricketers this time around and look confident to go all the way. However, the coach Daniel Vettori reckons that the role of Brendon McCullum will be crucial during the upcoming season of the cash-rich league.

In IPL 2017, RCB witnessed their worst performance of the first decade of IPL as they failed even to find the right combination during the 14 matches they played. The veterans like Virat Kohli and AB de Villiers were also unable to score heavily as the line-up depended on them completely. However, in the upcoming season, they’ve taken care of the same and have picked some worthy players to cover up for those superstars.

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Vettori has acknowledged the fact that during the IPL players’ auction 2018, they were desperate to have a leader like Brendon McCullum in the side and they were extremely happy after bagging his services.

Daniel said, “We were really desperate to have those leaders within the group because we probably had just AB and Virat last year. He’s going to be a confidant to Virat, because of his leadership skills. He brings a style of play we really want at RCB. He’s a great fielder too. Now we’ve added a few more leaders – Brendon, Parthiv Patel, and Quinton de Kock, who we think is a leader as well.”

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The RCB coach further added that they wanted to assemble a core group of Indian players in the team and they were successful in doing that as well. He said, “There was a considered effort to assemble a strong group of domestic bowlers. We’d seen enough of Washington Sundar (to expect the performance, he delivered in Sri Lanka). He’s bowled in the Powerplay pretty much his whole T20 career. We’ll look to utilize that as well.”