Punjab Kings vs Royal Challengers Bangalore Betting Preview

Punjab Kings were one of the teams who had a really good mega auction. They may have lost talismanic skipper and run machine KL Rahul who opted to not be retained but a strategy of only retaining two players meant they went into the auction with one of the biggest budgets.

It allowed them to buy English power batting duo Jonny Bairstow and Liam Livingstone, prolific IPL runscorer Shikhar Dhawan, ace pace bowler Kagiso Rabada, spinner Rahul Chahar and exciting West Indies all-rounder Odean Smith among others.

Their batting line-up looks one of the strongest in the competition and this could be their best campaign in years. RCB decided to retain Virat Kohli but as we know, he’s no longer captain. He had already resigned last season and it will be South African Faf du Plessis taking over from him, a man also expected to score plenty of runs at the top of the order.

Glen Maxwell was also retained while Sri Lankan spinner Hasaranga de Silva is one of the best bowlers in this format. Josh Hazlewood looks a good signing and Harshal Patel also comes in as an important wicket-taking option.

But will things really be that different for a side that disappoints year after year?

PBKS vs RCB SATTA Odds

RCB are slight favorites at 1.85 on Betway which is a bit surprising. But then again, they’re slightly shorter than Punjab in the outright IPL betting to win the whole IPL so it makes sense they should be favorites to win the match.

The slight problem with the 2022 IPL is that there are so many changes to personnel that it’s hard to work out who looks strongest before they’ve played a couple of games.

But here’s what we do know. RCB will be missing Australian duo Glenn Maxwell and Josh Hazlewood for this game and those are huge losses. The former was their best batsman last year and has been in good form, the latter sets the tone with the new ball and was excellent last year at CSK.

Punjab Kings will be without Rabada and Bairstow. Rabada has just finished international duty, Bairstow is right in the middle of it. They’re all huge losses but perhaps it’s RCB who will find it harder to replace that pair.

PBKS vs RCB Match Prediction

On paper, these look like two pretty well-matched sides and there’s not much to choose between them. But this should be a high-scoring match on a good wicket and as things stand, Punjab look to have a better, more powerful, and longer batting line-up, so could trump RCB in the batting department in a high-scoring affair.

And as we said already, those two absences to RCB could hurt them more than the ones to Punjab so it’s the latter who are slightly the better bet to win the game.

PBKS vs RCB BETWAY best BeTS

Here are the best bets that you can take in PBKS vs RCB T20 match:

Hasaranga de Silva to be RCB Top Bowler @ 4.0 with Betway

Sri Lankan Hasaranga de Silva could end up being one of the big stars of this year’s IPL. It wasn’t so long ago that he was the top wicket-taker at the 2021 World Cup where many of the world’s best batsmen failed to read his variations.

He has little experience of playing in the IPL but that could actually work in his favor, with not any batsmen having faced him so much before. The absence of Hazlewood means he has one less excellent bowler to beat and 4.0 he’s their top wicket-taker is too good to turn down.

Liam Livingstone to score a 50 @ 4.5 with Betway

Few players had as good 2021 as Liam Livingstone who impressed in the Big Bash League, The Hundred and for England last year. He has quickly become one of the world’s best T20 exponents with his tremendous power and timing too good for even the best bowlers.

Like Hasaranga, he doesn’t have too much IPL experience having only played a handful of games last season. But he will have been preparing for his big chance for the past few months. With no Bairstow here, he may get a promotion up the order to number three from his usual position at four.

On what promises to be a good wicket, he could easily start in style with a 50 here.

Pbks vs RCB Projected Playing XI

PBKS: Dhawan, Agarwal, Livingstone, Rajapaksa, Shahrukh, Odean Smith, Harpreet, Sandeep Sharma, Rahul Chahar, Ellis, Arshdeep.

RCB: Du Plessis, Anuj Rawat, Kohli, Rutherford, Karthik, Hasaranga, Willey, Shahbaz, Harshal Patel, Lomror, Siraj.

Pbks vs RCB Head-to-Head

Looking at the PBKS v RCB head-to-head, the Punjab Kings are just about ahead after 28 matches. They’ve won 15 and lost 13.

RCB won both matches that season in IPL 2019. In IPL 2020, it was Punjab who won both, and last year it was one win each. So, it’s always been pretty tight between these two. Should make for a great game.