IPL 2021: Virat Kohli’s RCB to begin camp on March 29, reveals Mike Hesson

Defending champions Mumbai Indians will take on RCB in Chennai in the IPL 2021 opener on April 9.

Virat Kohli's Royal Challengers Bangalore will take on Mumbai Indians in the opening match of IPL 2021 on April 9. (Photo: BCCI/IPL)

Royal Challengers Bangalore’s (RCB) Director of Cricket Mike Hesson has said that the team’s training camp will begin on March 29 for the upcoming edition of the Indian Premier League (IPL). The RCB on Wednesday shared a video on Twitter in which Hesson revealed the date on which the camp will commence.

RCB’s IPL 2021 Camp and Player Availability

When’s the pre-season camp starting? When are the overseas players arriving? On @myntra presents Bold Diaries, Mike Hesson leaves no room for speculations ahead of #VivoIPL2021.#PlayBold #WeAreChallengers #IPL2021 #Classof2021 pic.twitter.com/yxBFNYVwW8

— Royal Challengers Bangalore (@RCBTweets) March 24, 2021

The IPL Governing Council, earlier this month, announced the schedule for the league, to be held in India across six venues from April 9. Defending champions Mumbai Indians will take on RCB in Chennai in the tournament opener. 

Hesson also said that AB de Villiers will arrive on March 28. “We have got players arriving all the way through till April 1. Finn Allen will be playing in T20I in New Zealand on April 1 and then he will come the day after... ABD arrives on 28,” he said.  

“It is very different than the last year where we had everybody together for a long period of time on the back of a period where the guys had not trained or played. So, this time it is different, we got players playing international cricket over here and overseas and domestic cricket up until a hand full of days ago. So, we had to prepare in slightly different ways,” former New Zealand head coach Hesson added.  

The final of the 14th edition of the tournament will be played on May 30 at the Narendra Modi Stadium in Ahmedabad. The IPL playoffs will also be played at the same venue.  

One of the highlights of this edition of the IPL will be the fact that all matches will be played at neutral venues, no team will play at their home venue. All teams will play at 4 out of 6 venues during the league stage. 

On Saturday, India defeated England in the fifth T20I, and as a result, the hosts won the series 3-2. In the match, India and RCB skipper Virat Kohli had opened the innings and scored an unbeaten 80.  

(with ANI inputs)

After the match, Kohli had said: “I am going to open in the IPL to keep all options open. I have batted at three, four and now I need to understand my role as an opener which I have done successfully in the past in T20 cricket so that I provide an option to open up a slot for someone like Surya, if he can continue to bat like that, I should be open to playing any kind of role that the team requires me to. We will have a conversation about this when we get closer to the T20 World Cup. It would be interesting to see how I go about my job as an opener in the IPL.”