Rajasthan Royals (RR) has won the inaugural Indian Premier League (IPL) title in 2008. Under Shane Warne’s captaincy, RR played their best ever IPL tournament as they were the winners of 2008 IPL edition. After a two-year suspension, Rajasthan Royals re-entered the competition in 2018 and made an impressive comeback by reaching 2018 IPL’s playoffs. They were knocked out by KKR in Eliminator and thus eliminated from the tournament.
The Jaipur-based won the first edition of IPL and since then the trophy has eluded them. They made it to the playoffs of IPL 2013, 2015 and 2018, the best finish after their title win in 2008 under Shane Warne’s captaincy.
Last season, Steven Smith was suspended by the Cricket Australia (CA) in the ball-tampering scandal ahead of IPL 2018. It resulted in Smith exclusion from IPL as well and Royals named Ajinkya Rahane as their captain. Smith is expected to take the captainship duties back for the upcoming IPL season.
Rajasthan Royals released Jaydev Unadkat from the squad, whom they have bought for whopping INR 11.5 Crore in 2018 IPL auction. Royals also released Australia’s D’Arcy Short and Ben Laughlin.
RR Team for IPL 2019:
Players bought: Jaydev Unadkat (Rs 8.4 cr), Varun Aaron (Rs 2.4 cr), Oshane Thomas (Rs 1.1 cr), Shashank Singh (30 lakh), Liam Livingstone (50 lakh), Shubham Rajane (20 lakh), Manan Vohra (20 lakh), Ashton Turner (50 lakh), Riyan Parag (20 lakh).
Retained Players: Steven Smith, Ben Stokes, Jos Buttler, Jofra Archer, Ish Sodhi, Ajinkya Rahane, K Gowtham, Sanju Samson, Shreyas Gopal, Aryaman Birla, S Midhun, Prashant Chopra, Stuart Binny, Rahul Tripathi, Dhawal Kulkarni, Mahipal Lomror.
Released Players: Jaydev Unadkat, Anureet Singh, Ankit Sharma, Jatin Saxena, D’Arcy Short, Ben Laughlin.
