During the auctions of the inaugural edition of the Indian Premier League (IPL), the liquor baron Vijay Mallya scooped up the opportunity and bought the Bangalore franchise and named it as Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB). He made the team the most with flair and style, even changing the team after their forgettable start in IPL 2008. The team made it to the finals in 2009 and has done so two more times, but always failed to lift the trophy.
RCB’s best year was 2016 when they were buoyed by Virat Kohli’s 973 runs. They reached the finals only to face defeat against the Sunrisers Hyderabad (SRH). The SRH unit after defeating RCB won their first IPL trophy. Since then, RCB has finished 8, 6 and 8 respectively in IPL 2017, 2018 and this season in 2019. Now though Vijay Mallya is a fugitive, who is living in London after stealing up billions of rupees in bank loans and who is fighting extradition proceedings, he still cannot forget his love for RCB it seems.
Despite being sagged from the management, it seems that the first owner of the franchise cannot forget his time in the limelight for the right reasons with the RCB team.
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On Sunday, after finishing the IPL 2019 campaign, the RCB skipper, Virat Kohli sent a message to the Bangalore unit after their win in the final match of the IPL, against SRH at home, which read “Thank you guys for all the love & support — the entire team including the fans, the ground staff & the support staff! Promise to come back stronger next year.”
https://www.instagram.com/p/BxFYB3VAPzj/?utm_source=ig_embed
Vijay Mallya couldn’t help himself from tweeting out the Instagram post with a comment of his own, writing, “Always a great line up but sadly on paper only. Devastated with the wooden spoon.”
Always a great line up but sadly on paper only. Devastated with the wooden spoon. https://t.co/6uYYbXJxVq
— Vijay Mallya (@TheVijayMallya) May 5, 2019
In IPL 2019, RCB registered as many as first six games before winning their first game against KXIP and then lost a few more, before coming back to win a few more games but still finished last on the points table, with 5 wins from 14 matches and 11 points.
