On March 22, the Royal Challengers Bengaluru (RCB) and the reigning champion Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) will square off in the Indian Premier League (IPL) 2025. The Men in Red will select a new opening combination as a result of some major squad adjustments they made for the forthcoming competition.
In the batting area, the Bengaluru team has a lot of firepower. Faf du Plessis and Virat Kohli were their opening duo in the previous two seasons. The franchise has released Du Plessis, thus RCB will be searching for new combinations at the top. Numerous solutions may be available, and each one has the potential to be successful.
Here are the top three probable opening pairs for RCB in the upcoming tournament:
1. Phil Salt and Virat Kohli
This is most likely going to be the first-choice opening pair for the franchise. While Phil Salt is known for his attacking style of batting Kohli can make sure that there are no dot balls at the other end. Though it might be the first time the duo will be batting together it still looks like a strong opening pair on paper that could create nightmares for bowlers.
Phil Salt has already established himself as a trustworthy opening batter in the shortest format of the game and is currently ranked number three in the ICC T20I rankings. Virat might have retired from T20Is but has nearly 13,000 runs in T20s and has shown that he is capable of switching from attack to defence when needed.
2. Devdutt Padikkal and Virat Kohli
This could be another move from RCB which could allow Devdutt Padikkal to play a more attacking game since the legendary Virat Kohli will most likely continue with an anchoring role. Knowing that the two have also played together in the past and it would be a left-right combination could tempt the franchise to go with this pairing.
Kohli has been making a lot of runs for RCB while opening the batting, and though he has been a great player at number three as well, the franchise might still choose to let him continue to open the batting with Padikkal who will be looking to rediscover his old self.
3. Phil Salt and Devdutt Padikkal
There might be a chance that the management could decide to give some confidence to Devdutt Padikkal who could not perform in the last season. Phil Salt has a high chance of being an opener for the three-time IPL finalists looking at his record in that role in the T20 format.
Salt played for KKR last season where he scored 435 runs in 12 matches and will be up against his former team in the opening game. Padikkal will be back in the RCB fold after three seasons and will want to make a comeback after last season where he could only manage to score 38 runs in seven games for the Lucknow Super Giants.
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