Rajasthan Royals’ head coach Rahul Dravid, on Wednesday, explained that the lack of apparent home advantage for teams in the ongoing Indian Premier League (IPL) campaign could be attributed to the mega auction being held prior to this season.
"It's the first year after a big auction, so for a lot of the players as well, even though they may be your home players, they are playing for those teams or those grounds for the first time,” Dravid was quoted as saying by PTI ahead of Rajasthan Royals’ match against Royal Challengers Bengaluru on Thursday.
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The IPL conducts mega auctions every few years where teams can overhaul their squads almost entirely. This differs from mini-auctions held in intervening seasons, where only selected players are bought or replaced.
“So, I think that when you just have a big auction and there's a change of squad, the home advantage may not be that significant. But maybe as you go later on into the cycle, maybe you might start seeing their significance a little bit more, because then your players get to practice and play a little bit more,” the Indian cricket legend noted.
“So, maybe, that could be a factor as well, that some teams are sort of home advantage is not that prevalent this time,” Dravid added.
The mega auction was held before IPL 2025 and led to significant squad changes across franchises.
The former Indian national team head coach cited the example of Nitish Rana, who used to ply his trade for Kolkata Knight Riders but joined the Royals at this season’s mega auction, to drive home his point.
“We have players in our team, for example, someone like Nitish Rana (KKR) was not with us and he's playing for us this year, so for him, Jaipur is actually kind of a new ground,” Dravid noted.
Dravid will be hoping to mastermind a Rajasthan Royals victory over RCB at the M Chinnaswamy Stadium in Bengaluru and help his team climb up the IPL 2025 table.
