Mo Bobat shares latest update about Josh Hazlewood’s availability
As RCB gears up for their first challenge in IPL 2026, set to lock horns with Sunrisers Hyderabad, major speculations remain about the availability of Australian pace ace, Josh Hazlewood. He had his best IPL season in 2025, claiming 22 wickets at an economy rate of 8.77, becoming one of RCB’s key assets.
However, Hazlewood has been recovering from an injury which has clouded his return to cricket. In a pre-tournament press conference ahead of IPL 2026, RCB’s Director of Cricket, Mo Bobat, shared the latest update about Hazlewood's availability.
Bobat said, “So, as most people would know, Josh has missed quite a bit of cricket recently with injuries. So he's currently working through a return to play programme. He's doing that in Australia currently. We are liaising very closely with both Josh and Cricket Australia. And our medical teams are collaborating very strongly on a day-to-day basis on this programme.”
Highlighting Hazlewood’s possible return, Bobat added, “We'll continue to communicate with him. And as soon as he gets to a point where Cricket Australia are happy, he'll come over. And we hope to have him with us very soon.”
Mo also opened up on the potential options RCB might deploy in Yash Dayal's absence, adding, “The Yash Dayal situation has been tricky because obviously it's been around for some time now. And it's difficult to predict what will happen. We went into our auction planning for a worst-case scenario, that he may not be available for us. And so we have recruited accordingly. We have some excellent domestic fast bowlers in our squad.”
He concluded by naming the players who can actually step up, stating, “Rasikh, who many of you will know, Abhinandan had been there last year. And then we also signed Mangesh in this auction. So, domestically we have three excellent potential options that we're facing. So, it's obviously a blow losing a player like Yash. That's obvious, he's been an important part of us for the last couple of years. But we're very confident in the options we've got in the squad. And we will select a team accordingly.”
