New Delhi, April 7 – Indian cricketer Devdutt Padikkal has admitted that returning to Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) in the 2025 Indian Premier League (IPL) proved to be a turning point in his career, as it gave him clarity about the kind of cricket he wanted to play.
In 2025, Padikkal played a crucial role at the top of the order for RCB, scoring 247 runs in 10 matches at an impressive strike rate of 150.61. In 2026, he scored 111 runs in just two games at a strike rate of 201.82.
"I feel that the auction was probably the turning point of my career in many ways. I was at a stage in my career where I needed to really commit to the type of cricket I wanted to play, the kind of cricketer I wanted to be. And returning to RCB paved the way for the brand of cricket I wanted to play," Padikkal said in a video released by RCB on X.
"When I got that opportunity with RCB, I feel that's the day I decided that there were a lot of things I needed to do, and I needed to really commit to working on those things, regardless of the outcome or the result," he added.
Padikkal made an immediate impact in his debut 2020 IPL season with RCB, scoring 473 runs and winning the Emerging Player Award. After spending a few seasons with the Rajasthan Royals and Lucknow Super Giants, RCB bought him back at his base price of Rs 2 Crore during the 2025 mega auction.
"I moved to LSG for that one year, and obviously, that didn't go great either. It was really hard. I felt that everything comes down to money. When a franchise is putting their faith in you in terms of that much money they are paying you, you feel like you are letting them down when you don't perform. At that point, honestly, I didn't have any answers either," he said.
"I did not understand it enough. The way the season went, it really dampened a lot of things that had happened that year. But at the same time, that gave me that motivation and that real fire in me to try and get better, and sometimes you need that. You need those failures along your journey to remind you how much harder you need to work to get to where you want to get to," he added.
