The tenure of a new captain will also begin with the IPL 2026 season. When Rajasthan Royals take the field for their first match on March 30, Riyan Parag's captaincy will begin in the true sense. Although in the last season also he had captained the team in some matches, but this time he will be completely responsible for the team and the biggest challenge before him is to replace the former captain Sanju Samson, who has been the most successful batsman of this team. But Ryan also knows that replacing Sanju is not easy and he compared it to Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma.
till last season Rajasthan Royals Sanju Samson, who was the captain of Chennai Super Kings, joined Chennai Super Kings for the new season. It was only after the last season that news of his separation from the franchise started coming. Eventually Rajasthan and Chennai traded Sanju and Ravindra Jadeja with each other. Rajasthan replaced Sanju with Riyan as captain, but has he got a capable replacement as a batsman, will the team be able to do this?
A similar question was asked by Riyan Parag, when he came for the first press conference as captain before the start of the new season. In this press conference held on Thursday, March 19, on the question of replacing Sanju, Captain Parag said, "If we talk about Sanju Bhai, we do not think of replacing that player. What we can do is to find a player of that skill or get him batting at that number. Just like there is no replacement for Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma, the same is with Sanju Bhai. There is no replacement for him either, he is such a good player."
VIDEO | Rajasthan Royals captain Riyan Parag, speaking at the IPL 2026 pre-season press conference, says Sanju Samson is irreplaceable and stresses the teams focus on better planning and finishing games this season.
He says, “We never thought of replacing him (Sanju Samson). pic.twitter.com/n9HuGqJ0DH
— Press Trust of India (@PTI_News) March 19, 2026
Sanju Samson was one of the most successful captains and batsmen of Rajasthan. He played 11 seasons for Rajasthan and scored more than 4000 runs in about 150 matches. He was also the highest run scorer for Rajasthan. It was under his captaincy that Rajasthan Royals reached the final of IPL 2022 after 14 years, where the team missed the title. Now Riyan Parag is not only faced with the challenge of repeating this, but also aims to improve the performance.
