IPL team Royal Challengers Bangalore and head coach Daniel Vettori have parted ways, the franchise announced, here.
“The parting was mutual. Vettori’s contract was up for renewal, and we wanted to bring in a different coaching perspective. After deliberations with the leadership team, we decided to move on,” RCB Chairman Sanjeev Churiwala said at a media interaction, here.
RCB batting coach Gary Kirsten has been appointed as coach and mentor, and the franchise will fill a few other coaching roles in due course.
Churiwala explained that RCB will not have a head coach this time around, but rather a flat-structured “leadership coaching team that will work together”.
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These changes have come about after RCB’s poor last-place finish in the IPL last year. Asked if RCB was over-reliant on skipper and star batsman Virat Kohli, Kirsten replied, “No team would want to put pressure on just one or two players. The reason why we play a team game is that everyone has to make a contribution during the course of the tournament. Your best players might make more contributions, but everyone has to do their share. You cannot win trophies by relying on one or two guys to do everything for you.”
The former South African batsman is keen to make RCB a more consistent outfit. The team cannot afford to slip up from winning positions, Kirsten said. “In many ways, we did not deserve to make it to the playoffs this year. We were not consistent through the season. It is always great to have a good start to the season, as this relieves the pressure. Overall, two losses cost us - one against CSK in Bengaluru and the SRH game, where we failed to chase 147. We lost matches which we should have won,” he said.
Churiwala clarified that match-winning batsman A.B. de Villiers will continue to turn out for RCB. De Villiers had retired from international cricket, earlier, this year, adding that he will not play overseas. “De Villiers will be available for RCB. We have stated our intentions on this matter in the past as well,” Churiwala said.
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