Rajasthan Royals owner wants another team to be added to the IPL

Rajasthan Royals had etched their name into the history books by winning the pinnacle edition of the Indian Premier League. Royals, who won the inaugural edition of the tournament under Shane Warne in 2008 but could never make another final, was suspended for two seasons along with Chennai Super Kings on spot-fixing charges. They returned in 2018 but haven’t impressed on their return.

Indian Premier League (IPL) franchise Rajasthan Royals (RR) owner Manoj Badale thinks adding another franchise to the fray will benefit the tournament in many ways. The annual T20 tournament is generally an eight-team affair but in 2011, a total of 10 teams had participated. According to Badale, adding another team will help the league grow further.

“We believe that eight is a good number of teams for the IPL given the length of the window and the logistics for all franchises and star. Adding a new franchise will, however, enable a new stadium to be played in, new fans to be deeply engaged in this amazing sport and more matches for our avid supporters, which are certainly beneficial to the game,” India.com cited agencies as quoting Badale as saying.

Rajasthan Royals bought Robin Uthappa in the IPL 2020 auction

Ahead of the 2020 season, the franchise bought players like Robin Uthappa, Jaydev Unadkat, Kartik Tyagi, Anuj Rawat, Oshane Thomas and David Miller among others. Badale said they have put into place a team that can win the franchise its second IPL trophy.

“We believe we now have the right combination of captain and coach for success. We ran an extremely robust process through the summer to select Andrew McDonald and are very happy with the appointment, while in (Steve) Smith we have the captain with one of the best win records in the IPL,” he said. Smith missed the 2018 edition because of his ban and returned to play in the 2019 season. He reclaimed the captaincy from Ajinkya Rahane who led in his absence but failed to inspire.

Badale also supports the idea of organising international friendlies to further the brand of the IPL. “We played the first and only ever international friendly in Lords in 2009 against Middlesex and would certainly be supportive of playing some friendly matches abroad each year,” he said, adding that the support for the IPL in every cricket-playing nation around the world is big and playing international friendlies would give the fans an opportunity to see their heroes from close quarters and create electric atmospheres in the stands.

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