Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) enjoys a humongous fanbase, but they have never managed to win an IPL in 15 seasons. The fans throng the M Chinnaswamy Stadium in numbers and because of stars like Virat Kohli, AB de Villiers, and Chris Gayle, whenever and wherever the team played in the last three years, the loyal fanbase supported its favorite team. Kohli is the only player to have played for just one franchise in 16 seasons from IPL’s inception in 2008, the bond has become unbreakable.
When the franchise ventured into having a Women’s Premier League (WPL) team, RCB benefitted by having star players like Smriti Mandhana, Ellyse Perry, Megan Schutt, Richa Ghosh, and Renuka Singh Thakur among others. The crowd support for RCB was the second highest after Mumbai Indians since all matches were played in Mumbai.
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Before the start of the tournament, Mandhana, the skipper, of RCB’s WPL team was asked about comparisons because of several similarities with Kohli and she had said, “I don’t like that kind of comparison because what he (Kohli) has achieved is amazing. I just hope that I reach that level, but I’m nowhere near. What he has achieved for this franchise (RCB), I would like to try and do that.”
However, despite having some of the biggest names, RCB failed to do much as they managed to win just a couple of games and finished fourth in a five-team tournament. The fans were quick to draw parallels between the WPL and WPL teams of RCB as the men’s team too despite all things going their way haven’t won a title yet and fail to deliver when it matters the most.
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Now, taking a dig at Virat Kohli regarding the same, RCB Insider Mr Nags (played by Danish Sait), asked Kohli to comment on Mandhana’s statement of her achieving great things as the former RCB skipper has done for the franchise. And then he was quick to add that RCB women won just two matches and that might be the right direction Mandhana is in, being the captain of the side (referring to RCB’s terrible IPL record).
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Virat Kohli couldn’t stop laughing and even mouthed a couple of cuss words, which were muted before responding to it seriously. He said, “This is big franchise pressure. A lot of people take it as fun and games, ‘this team doesn’t win. Come play when you have so much expectations, we are a big team otherwise, why would we have so many fans if we had some faltu team?”