'RCB played a big role': Yuzvendra Chahal thanks Royal Challengers Bengaluru for helping him earn India cap
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'RCB played a big role': Yuzvendra Chahal thanks Royal Challengers Bengaluru for helping him earn India cap originally appeared on Cricket News. Add Cricket News as a Preferred Source by clicking here.
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KEY TAKEAWAYS:
- Yuzvendra Chahal credits Royal Challengers Bengaluru for a major role in his India call-up.
- Senior spinners and a seamer-friendly Lahli pitch limited his chances in Haryana’s red-ball side.
- He took 139 wickets for RCB from 2014 to 2021 before debuting for India.
Yuzvendra Chahal reflects on breakthrough years: How RCB provided the platform for Team India
Yuzvendra Chahal has thanked Royal Challengers Bengaluru for the part the franchise played in helping him earn his India cap.
The leg-spinner, who has gone on to become one of the country's most successful white-ball bowlers, spoke candidly about his early years in a conversation with former India opener and broadcaster Aakash Chopra.
Chahal’s story with the franchise dates back to 2014, when he joined the team after a quiet start to his IPL career. Mumbai Indians had signed him for the 2011 to 2013 seasons, but that stint brought him little game time experience and left him largely unnoticed on the domestic circuit.
He explained that the move to Bengaluru was the point at which things finally took off, because regular games put his bowling in front of a much wider audience.
“When I went to RCB, from there my real IPL journey started... because from there I started playing, and people got to know that, ‘Look, there is a Yuzi Chahal,’” he said.
He went on to say that the franchise deserved a large share of the credit for what followed in his career. “And I think RCB has a very big hand in me getting the Indian jersey,” Chahal added.
Part of the reason RCB mattered so much, according to Chahal, was the lack of opportunity he faced at home. Breaking into Haryana’s red-ball side was close to impossible in those days, since the team already had senior spinners such as Amit Mishra and Jayant Yadav, who held the places in the playing XI.
The conditions didn’t help either. Haryana’s main home venue, the Chaudhary Bansi Lal Cricket Stadium in Lahli, Rohtak, is well known across Indian domestic cricket as a green surface where fast bowlers dominate, and spinners often don’t get a bowl at all. Four-day matches there therefore gave him almost no visibility.
Chahal touched on both points while describing that phase of his career. “At that time, I wasn’t playing that much Ranji Trophy since Mishra bhaiyya was there, Jayant Yadav was there, and the Lahli wicket is a bit seamer-friendly... so you didn’t really get to play that much,” he recalled.
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How did RCB help Chahal get his white-ball platform and the India blue jersey?
With the red-ball route effectively shut, the IPL became the stage that mattered. Chahal said that it was the white-ball exposure with RCB, rather than anything in domestic cricket, that eventually led to his national call-up.
“The real white-ball platform that I got was through RCB, the blue jersey that I received. And I always say that from there, my white-ball journey started,” he said.
He then explained how the exposure changed perceptions of him: “People came to know how he plays, what this Yuzi Chahal is, and where he came from. So RCB has a huge hand in that.”
Chahal represented the franchise from 2014 to 2021, and his returns over those years were consistent, even though roughly half of his games were played at the M. Chinnaswamy Stadium, a ground with a reputation for being friendly to batters.
Those regular wickets in Bengaluru paved the way for his India debut in both ODIs and T20Is on the tour of Zimbabwe in June 2016. The step set him on a path that eventually made him India’s all-time leading wicket-taker in T20 internationals.
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Yuzvendra Chahal for RCBFigureYears with the franchise2014 to 2021Matches played113Wickets139Economy rate7.58Chahal’s story shows how much opportunity shapes a career
Chahal’s account is a useful reminder that talent alone doesn’t guarantee recognition, and that the right platform often decides how far a player goes.
He wasn’t short of skill in his Haryana days, yet the combination of experienced spinners ahead of him and a pitch that rarely suited his craft meant that very few people had a chance to see it.
It also says something about how the Indian game has changed. The IPL has become a genuine shop window for cricketers who can’t find a regular place in domestic red-ball cricket, and Chahal’s rise from one match for Mumbai Indians to India’s leading T20I wicket-taker is among the best examples of that shift.
However, his comments should prompt some reflection among state associations. A pitch like Lahli’s, which seldom lets spinners bowl, can quietly narrow a young bowler’s development, and not every player will get a second chance with a franchise.
It would be healthier for the system if more domestic venues offered a balance between bat, seam and spin, so that talent gets noticed through the Ranji Trophy as well. Chahal found his way through RCB, but the route shouldn’t need to be that narrow.
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