Kamal Ghorui
NEW DELHI: Royal Challengers Bengaluru (RCB) have started preparations for the 2026 edition of the Indian Premier League at M Chinnaswamy Stadium. While some top Indian stars, led by Virat Kohli, have been in attendance, bowler Yash Dayal remains a notable absentee. He wasn’t spotted with the group on their first day of the camp on March 18 and continues to be missing from action.
Rajat Patidar, Krunal Pandya, Jitesh Sharma, Suyash Sharma, and Bhuvneshwar Kumar are prominent names preparing for the title defence under the coaching staff led by Andy Flower, but Dayal’s mysterious absence has already raised eyebrows.There are pictures of RCB’s team bus circulating on social media, and Dayal is not visible in those, either. Additionally, the multiple social media posts by the franchise do not mention the bowler.In a video uploaded by his wife, Shweta Pundir, on Instagram, Dayal can be seen receiving throwdowns from a side-arm specialist, but he seemed far away from the action in Bengaluru.
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TimesofIndia.com reached out to multiple RCB officials for an update on Dayal, but they are yet to respond. The franchise retained the cricketer for Rs 5 crore ahead of last year’s mini-auction in Jeddah and received significant backlash because of the legal case against the cricketer at that time.Dayal’s last competitive appearance was in June 2025 when he played for RCB in the IPL final against the Punjab Kings. Since then, the bowler has been sidelined from competitive cricket. Uttar Pradesh did not consider him for the entire domestic season. It has been learnt that the BCCI Centre of Excellence contacted the Uttar Pradesh Cricket Association (UPCA) last September to check on the bowler, but the officials could not establish contact with him. “The case was going on against him, so he wasn’t considered for selection. I remember there was a call from CoE checking on him in September, but we weren’t able to establish any contact with Yash Dayal. He has even changed his number. Even his childhood coach doesn’t know his whereabouts,” a UPCA official tells TimesofIndia.com. It remains to be seen whether or not he will feature for the RCB in this year’s IPL.
