Winning is a habit, they say. When success comes, momentum takes over, confidence grows, and victories begin to feel almost natural. But when a team is stuck in a cycle of defeats, even the smallest setbacks seem magnified. Luck appears elusive, belief starts to fade, and the light at the end of the tunnel becomes difficult to spot. Few franchises have experienced both extremes quite like Royal Challengers Bengaluru.
On Sunday, Rajat Patidar etched his name into IPL history by becoming only the third captain, after MS Dhoni and Rohit Sharma, to successfully defend an IPL title. The achievement has rightly earned Patidar widespread praise across the cricketing fraternity.
It wasn’t long ago that RCB were labelled perennial underachievers despite boasting some of the biggest names in world cricket. The franchise endured years of heartbreak and became the target of endless jokes, with the famous ‘Ee Sala Cup Namde’ slogan often used for trolling rather than a rallying cry.
Yet every success story has a starting point. While Patidar deserves immense credit for continuing RCB’s golden run, the real turning point came when Smriti Mandhana stepped in as captain, the franchise’s true Lady Luck, who changed its fortunes from within. Under her leadership, RCB captured their first-ever major title by winning the Women’s Premier League in 2024.
More importantly, Mandhana gave the franchise something it had long been searching for: belief. She showed that RCB could win trophies. Patidar is now carrying that legacy forward, but it was Mandhana who first turned a hopeful dream into a winning habit.
HOW MANDHANA BUILT THE PLATFORM
RCB’s men’s team had won nothing until 2024 and was often criticised for faltering in crunch moments. The women’s side initially followed a similar script, losing five matches on the trot in the inaugural 2023 season. The trolling was relentless, and RCB once again found themselves under scrutiny, barely escaping a bottom-place finish.
Questions were also raised over Smriti Mandhana’s captaincy, especially with a proven leader like Heather Knight, who had helped England win the 2017 World Cup, in the squad. With stars like Ellyse Perry, Megan Schutt and Sophie Devine in the lineup, the expectation was clear, yet success remained elusive. It seemed RCB were simply not built for titles.
That perception changed in 2024 when Mandhana led from the front to become the first RCB skipper to lift a trophy. In the final against Delhi Capitals, when Meg Lanning and Shafali Verma stormed to 64 runs in just 7.1 overs, RCB looked under extreme pressure. But Mandhana’s composure stood out as she orchestrated a remarkable turnaround, guiding her side to a dominant 8-wicket win.
Although they fell short in 2025, Mandhana delivered another defining season in 2026. Her 41-ball 87 in the final against the Capitals was a statement of intent, especially because RCB were trying to achieve the highest successful run-chase in WPL history. Under pressure, she thrived rather than faded.
Mandhana didn’t just win matches, she changed belief. RCB learned to win with their backs against the wall. Today, the men’s team draws confidence from their women’s counterpart, and a franchise once labelled underachievers now stands among the most formidable in Indian cricket.
THE SPEECH THAT CHANGED EVERYTHING
In 2023, when RCB were going through a rough patch in the WPL, Virat Kohli stepped in with a motivational speech that felt more like lived experience than leadership advice. Kohli, who now has two IPL trophies, was still without a title back then—much like the RCB women’s team, and even earlier versions of the men’s side that had struggled for years to turn promise into silverware.
He knew the feeling too well. The frustration of close games, the weight of expectations, and the endless questions about why RCB couldn’t get over the line.
“There is no guarantee that we can give fans a cup every year, but there’s a guarantee that we give our 110 percent,” he said.
Those words quietly shifted something inside the camp. The obsession with outcomes began to fade, replaced by a sharper focus on effort, intent, and consistency. And in many ways, that is where the narrative began to turn for RCB.
The franchise that once waited 17 years for its first title at any level has now gone on to win four trophies across the IPL and WPL in just three years. Smriti Mandhana laid the early foundation of belief, and now Rajat Patidar is carrying that momentum forward.
After Sunday’s triumph, Patidar even spoke about RCB aiming to become the first IPL team to win three titles in a row. A couple of years ago, that would have sounded like a distant fantasy, almost wishful thinking. Today, it no longer feels like a dream, it feels like a direction RCB genuinely believes it can walk.
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