Why Do Teams Have No Home Advantage In IPL 2025? Rahul Dravid Gives Unique Explanation
Rahul Dravid, Rajasthan Royals coach, says IPL 2025's lack of home advantage is due to player shuffles from the auction, not pitch conditions, citing new players like Nitish Rana.
Rajasthan Royals (RR) head coach Rahul Dravid believes that the controversial concept of teams not enjoying any ‘home advantage’ in IPL 2025 is mostly related to the player shuffle that happened in the auction. He thinks that instead of pitches being non-conducive to teams, it’s the new signings, like Nitish Rana at RR from Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR), who could be struggling to adapt to the home conditions of their franchise.
Dravid’s comments came on the eve of his side’s match against Royal Challengers Bengaluru (RCB) — a team that has not won any of their three matches at home so far. Their mentor Dinesh Karthik had initially blamed it on the unusually slow tracks at the M Chinnaswamy Stadium. Other teams, like KKR, Lucknow Super Giants (LSG) and Chennai Super Kings (CSK) have also complained about their home pitches not helping their teams.
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“I think it depends from ground to ground really. I’m not really sure what specific franchises might have wanted from their curators, so to speak, but home advantage, generally, the teams are new as well right after a big auction," Dravid said at the pre-match press conference.
“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. For example, in the case of say, at RCB, someone like Phil Salt was at KKR and he’s coming here for the first time, I’m just using him as an example. 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," he added.
Even RR have not won any matches in Jaipur. One of their two wins came at their second home ground, the Baraspara Stadium.
“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. So, maybe, that could be a factor as well, that some teams are sort of home advantage is not that prevalent this time," Dravid concluded.
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