The Royal Challengers Bengaluru (RCB) sprung a big surprise on Thursday, announcing the appointment of Rajat Patidar as the team’s skipper. Since the conclusion of the Indian Premier League (IPL) 2025 auction, rumours linking Virat Kohli with a return to the leadership role were doing rounds. However, RCB seemed to have resisted the temptation as they decided to put a long-term bet in Rajat Patidar. However, in a media briefing after the captaincy announcement event, the Bengaluru franchise admitted that both Kohli and Patidar were ‘options’ for the leadership role since the retentions for the 2025 season were announced.

RCB didn’t go all-in for other leadership candidates in the IPL 2025 auction. The likes of Shreyas Iyer, KL Rahul and Rishabh Pant were unarguably the most sought-after options for the franchise. RCB didn’t sign either of the three while also deciding to release their skipper Faf du Plessis.

“We wanted to focus on assembling the right team, rather than just hunting for an individual that might fill a leadership role. So for us it was simply a case of just prioritising accordingly, trying to get the right team in place, trusting that we had internal options,” RCB team director Mo Bobat said.

Bobat also hinted that both Kohli and Patidar were in the race for the captaincy role. The franchise, in the end, put the stamp of approval on the younger of the two batters.

“If we didn’t recruit anybody from external, we were very happy with both Rajat and Virat as options, and other players that we might recruit. So for us it was never something that needed to be a major constraint. Those guys are all good players and I’m sure they’ll do well at their teams. We were very happy with the options we had internally. We were happy with lots of the other targets that we had and the guys that we brought in. So, it was never really a pressure point or a stress point for our decision making to have to hunt someone or go for them as captain. We had a number of options and we were very comfortable with the options that we had internally as well,” he said.

Patidar doesn’t have a lot of leadership experience. However, the Madhya Pradesh batter did lead his state team at the Syed Mushtaq Ali and Vijay Hazare Trophy tournaments this season.