Bobat on how Patidar recovered from his hand injury and how the week’s break helped in his recovery process.
Their international players were “adamant” to “come back and finish the job” because Royal Challengers Bengaluru (RCB) was having one of their best seasons in a long time before to the week-long suspension of the 2025 Indian Premier League, according to their team director Mo Bobat.
With eight victories and three defeats, RCB is presently ranked second in the standings. With 16 points, they are tied with the Gujarat Titans, who are at the top of the standings. One more victory will secure a postseason berth.
“We spoke quite a lot with our overseas guys even before they went and most of them were pretty adamant that they were keen to come back and finish the job,” Bobat said ahead of Saturday’s match against Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR). “We’ve had a good season so far, they want to come back and do that.”
Bobat withheld extensive information regarding Hazlewood’s availability, as he was absent from RCB’s final match prior to the league’s punishment. He attested to Rajat Patidar’s full recovery from a right-hand finger injury. Prior to the match against KKR, Patidar, the skipper of the RCB, batted in the nets for nearly thirty minutes without showing any signs of discomfort.
“With Josh, as you’ll probably be aware, he’s our only player not here at the minute. He’s recovering from his shoulder niggle that he had,” Bobat said. “He’s doing that with Cricket Australia. Obviously, our medical team and their medical team have been liaising on what that detail looks like. He’s just taking that day by day and he’s trying to improve.
“Patidar had an injury to his hand. He’s been building up ever so slowly. For him personally, probably the disruption gave him a few more days just to get through some of that early healing, for the swelling to go down and to get used to picking up [the bat] again. He’s practiced the last few days and he’s going well.”
“Obviously, we’ll lose Jacob Bethell and lose Lungi after a couple of games. So, there’s an obvious impact there,” Bobat said. “We’ve obviously got [Nuwan] Thushara in the squad, an international bowler chomping at the bit. Also, Rasikh Dar, a good bowler. So, we’ve got options in the squad, so certainly no concerns.
“Over the next few days, we’ll think about potential replacements. There’s a bit of clamour for that at the minute and lots of teams are doing that. I prefer not to push these things, so we’ll just take our time and have a think about it.”