Rajat Patidar has become an indispensable part of Royal Challengers Bengaluru’s (RCB) history by leading the franchise to back-to-back Indian Premier League (IPL) titles.
Stepping into the captaincy, Patidar ended an 18-year trophy drought by securing RCB's maiden IPL title in 2025. He then repeated the feat in 2026, while also dominating with the bat.
During the recently held IPL season, Patidar amassed 501 runs in 14 innings at a staggering strike rate of 192.69 with five half-centuries, including a whirlwind knock of 93* in Qualifier 1.
Despite his remarkable performance, the RCB skipper failed to make the cut in India’s T20I squads picked for the upcoming UK tour and the 2026 Asian Games.
Former India opener Sadagoppan Ramesh recently questioned Rajat Patidar’s omission from the T20I lineup.
"Shreyas Iyer has been made the T20I captain based on his IPL showing. But that raises the question on why there is no one in the T20I side from the two-time defending champions RCB. It is high time Rajat Patidar at least gets a look in as a player in the T20I squad. If not, atleast for the India A tours, Patidar must be considered as captain," Ramesh said on his Instagram handle.
Ramesh threw his weight behind another RCB batter Devdutt Padikkal, claiming that the southpaw deserves to play as No. 3 batter in the Indian Test team over Sai Sudharsan.
Ahead of India's one-off Test match against Afghanistan earlier this month, head coach Gautam Gambhir explicitly backed Sudharsan for an extended run over Padikkal. Gambhir's primary justification was that Sudharsan's six Test matches—largely played in challenging, seaming English conditions—did not constitute a "fair chance".
"Giving Sai opportunities is great, but Padikkal should be given just as much. Gambhir justified favoring Sai over Padikkal by saying Sai had limited chances in England, with the conditions in England being tough. But Sai actually played 6 out of the 10 innings in England. Meanwhile, when Padikkal last played in Australia, he got only two out of 10 innings," Ramesh stated.
"So it is clear Padikkal has got lesser opportunities compared to Sai. Gambhir's next point for favoring Sai was the tougher conditions in England. Yet, India's average score in the England series was 381 with 12 individual centuries. But the series in Australia, the average score for India was only 213 with just three centuries. So it is clear Padikkal has also played in tougher conditions than Sai," he further remarked.
