RCB Bold Diaries: Mo Bobat explains the key driver behind RCB’s retention and auction plans

With the retentions being announced already, RCB are now setting their sights on the upcoming IPL mega-auction. However, in an obvious question looming large, how do the Royal Challengers go on about their business? Mo Bobat, the Director of Cricket, opened up on the latest episode of RCB Bold Diaries about what exactly drives the run-up to the mega-auction.

Bobat said, “Once the retentions are in on the deadline, obviously people will be eagerly waiting to hear some of the announcements, to find out which teams have retained which players and who’s going to be available at the auctions. Obviously with the Right to Match rule, there’s still some uncertainty, there might be players that we like the look of or other teams like the look of.”

He further added, “With the Right to Match capability there is no guarantee that you get all of these players. I think the first task will be to make sense of the team’s retention and what it means for availability. Auctions are typically about supply and demand and until this point, you are kind of guessing and predicting supply and demand. Once we get past the deadline for retention, we can look at that with certainty and clarity. So that means you can start doing some more precise planning.”

Bobat continued, “For us as a core leadership group, we will make sense of that supply and demand, we will start looking at the options out there. Andy and I have been spending some time thinking about how we want to play, that’s our central thread that underpins our retention and auction decision making and that will hopefully come to life when we get into next season. So our attention will move to which players we think can fulfil a role for RCB to try and bring that to life.”