Gary Kirsten and Ashish Nehra join Royal Challengers Bangalore ahead of 2018 IPL

What's the story?

Ahead of the deadline for the 2018 IPL retentions, Royal Challengers Bangalore have confirmed that former South African international and the coach of India's 2011 World Cup squad, Gary Kirsten, and former Indian pacer and a member of the 2011 World Cup squad, Ashish Nehra, have joined the team as mentors and will also double up as a batting coach and a bowling coach respectively.

According to Cricbuzz, Kirsten, who was in talks with the franchise, signed on the dotted line last week.

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The South African is set for a second stint with an IPL franchise after he was associated with Delhi Daredevils as their head coach for three years before his contract was terminated in 2015.

Nehra, on the other hand, has played for Mumbai Indians, Delhi Daredevils, Sahara Pune Warriors, Chennai Super Kings and Sunrisers Hyderabad before he decided to hang up his boots after the first T20I against New Zealand at the Ferozeshah Kotla stadium in New Delhi last November.

Details

Former Kiwi international Daniel Vettori will continue to be the coach while Aussie Trent Woodhill will be in charge of the team as a batting talent development and analytics, fielding coach and the Head of scouring in the off-season.

Former Aussie all-rounder Andrew McDonald, who joined the franchise last season, will handle bowling talent development and analytics.

What's next?

The first assignment for the team management will be identifying the players who they are going to retain ahead of the 2018 IPL auction. The deadline for retention is January 4 and it is expected that the franchise from Bangalore will retain their skipper Virat Kohli and South African batsman AB de Villiers.

Author's Take

After punching below their weight on a consistent basis in the first 10 editions, RCB are ringing in changes to their team management in a bid to lift the trophy for the first time. Both Kirsten and Nehra are veterans of the sport and their experience will come in handy for the team.

The appointment of Nehra as the bowling coach will also help the bowlers, especially the local talents in the team to give their best and win matches for Virat Kohli and co., something that the team has been missing for a while.