Cricket

Over a year ago, when Andy Flower became head coach of Royal Challengers Bengaluru, the team was still striving to overcome years of missed opportunities. The women’s team had just lifted their maiden Women’s Premier League title under Smriti Mandhana. However, rather than being under heightened pressure to deliver, Flower relished the challenge, indicating that it was among the major reasons he signed up for the role in the first place. Ahmedabad: Royal Challengers Bengaluru’s Head Coach Andy Flower, captain Rajat Patidar and others lift the IPL title(PTI) “It is one of the main reasons I wanted to take this job,” he told Hindustan TImes last year. “It gives me a very exciting opportunity to see if we can do something special with RCB.” Flower was locked in on the title even before his RCB debut as head coach. And one year on, he delivered. For a team synonymous with near-misses, flamboyant stars, and a ‘Royally Loyal’ fanbase – as Virat Kohli called them after the title win – Flower’s arrival marked the beginning of a fundamental shift. Not just in results, but in the ethos of how RCB built and played their cricket. One of the words Flower repeatedly used during his interaction with this publication was “simplifying” the process. Whether it be on the field, or off it. And after the 2024 season, he put that philosophy into action, starting anew and transforming the approach from the ground up. RCB had long operated by banking on familiar names and legacy reputations, a pitfall the franchise had historically succumbed to. During the mid-2010s, the Virat Kohli-AB de Villiers-Chris Gayle trio defined RCB’s brand – dazzling, star-studded, but flawed. The team was too top-heavy, often lacking depth in bowling and flexibility in tactics. Under Flower, the 2025 auction signalled a clean break from that template. Despite Indian heavyweights like Rishabh Pant, KL Rahul, and Shreyas Iyer being up for grabs, RCB resisted the temptation. Instead, they built a squad around role clarity, targeting versatile, experienced, and rather unglamorous names who fit the team’s strategic needs. “The opportunity of winning a tournament is right there in front of us, but my personal view of taking on a challenge like that is always simplifying the route,” Flower told this publication. They invested in an Indian core of Krunal Pandya, Jitesh Sharma, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, and Suyash Sharma, and put their faith in overseas players like Phil Salt, Josh Hazlewood, Tim David, and Romario Shepherd. Most of these weren’t headline-making buys, but they were handpicked with a clear thought process. Each of them played defining roles at various stages of RCB’s victorious campaign. “I thought we did beautifully in picking a very balanced squad, knowing what sort of players we want and which player would fit in which role. As we were picking the team, we used to put players in certain roles and see how they fit,” Dinesh Karthik, the side’s mentor, had said about the squad. Big calls, bigger returns RCB left many in shock when they let go of Will Jacks at the auction. It was a gutsy move, but Phil Salt repaid the faith with a string of explosive starts. The backroom team’s approach also extended beyond auction-day calls. When Devdutt Padikkal was ruled out due to injury, the management opted for Mayank Agarwal, a seasoned campaigner with recent domestic form. Agarwal’s 41* in a crucial chase against LSG, alongside Jitesh Sharma’s whirlwind 85*, vindicated RCB’s decision. In the final, almost every batter in RCB’s lineup played a stop-start knock, with Mayank also contributing with an important 24. Even off the field, the environment Flower sought to create was deliberate. As Bobat explained, “For Andy and I, creating a sort of environment where people feel safe, where they feel backed, where they feel like they’re accountable for their own decisions, and where they’re able to hopefully showcase their strengths – that’s the key bit,” said Bobat. One of the boldest moves RCB made this season was handing the captaincy reins to Rajat Patidar. The decision raised eyebrows, as the franchise handed the captaincy to a player with no significant leadership pedigree at this level. But it worked. Patidar grew into the role, commanding respect through consistency and calmness. Flower and Bobat were careful in assembling a group that didn’t revolve around one or two leaders. That reflected in the side’s performances, too, with almost every game seeing different players emerging to lift RCB to victories. The result was a team that did not panic. Whether it was bouncing back from early defeats, surviving close chases, or defending tight totals, RCB this season never looked rattled. Their bowling unit, once seen as a liability in the previous seasons, held its nerve in crunch moments. Bhuvneshwar and Hazlewood brought control with the new ball, while Krunal and Shepherd proved valuable as utility players. In the final against Punjab Kings, RCB defended 191 with a performance that mirrored the very philosophy Flower had instilled. Calm, clinical, unflinching. In many ways, this wasn’t just RCB’s title. It was Andy Flower’s vindication. A reminder that behind every trophy is a system: a mix of right people, right roles, and the right temperament. What made this triumph even sweeter was how it looped back to Flower’s initial words, when he confidently stated that joining a side with no IPL title was an “exciting” prospect. That hunger to chase the unfinished made all the difference.