Royal Challengers Bengaluru are currently taking on the Rajasthan Royals at the MA Chidambaram Stadium in Bengaluru. This will be an important match for the Rajasthan Royals as they will need to win this to stay afloat in the IPL 2025. RR, however, will feel a huge void in their team, as their captain and talisman batter, Sanju Samson, is not part of the team tonight.

Sanju Samson suffered an injury while batting against the Delhi Capitals at the Arun Jaitley Stadium on April 16 (Wednesday). While cutting a ball from Vipraj Nigam, Samson suffered a side strain. He could only bat for one ball after that before he was retired hurt. This injury was serious as he missed the next RR match against Lucknow Super Giants (LSG).

Samson has not yet recovered from this injury and hence is missing from this game as well. In fact, he has not even travelled to Bengaluru with the rest of the team.

In Sanju Samson's absence, Riyan Parag is captaining RR against RCB. Vaibhav Suryavanshi opened the batting in Samson's absence in the last match vs LSG. He is likely to open the batting in this game as well.

RR mentor Rahul Dravid said that they will have to wait and see to review Samson's injury. They have a gap after 4th May, and Dravid hinted that he might be fit after that.

"I don't have a specific timeline for his return, but we're doing everything we can. We've got matches coming up quickly, and then a gap after the 4th. So, we'll just have to wait and see. As of now, he wasn't fit for this match, and that's why he didn't travel to Bengaluru," Dravid said.

Yashasvi Jaiswal, Shubham Dubey, Nitish Rana, Riyan Parag(c), Dhruv Jurel(w), Shimron Hetmyer, Wanindu Hasaranga, Jofra Archer, Fazalhaq Farooqi, Tushar Deshpande, Sandeep Sharma

Impact Subs: Vaibhav Suryavanshi, Yudhvir Singh Charak, Akash Madhwal, Kumar Kartikeya, Kunal Singh Rathore

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