“Spoke to Shah Rukh Sir that I am willing to take up the role”: Rana recalls how he got KKR captaincy last season

Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) pacer Nitish Rana recalls how he approached the franchise co-owner Shah Rukh Khan and conveyed his wish to become the captain in the absence of Shreyas Iyer.

The 29-year-old has played for the KKR franchise since 2018. He was appointed as the captain for the IPL 2023 season and led the side to 6 wins in the 14 games they played. Despite missing out on playoff qualification for the second consecutive season, he scored 400 runs for the first time in his IPL career.

While speaking with Jio Cinema, Rana recalled the discussions with head coach Chandrakant Pandit, co-owner Shah Rukh Khan and CEO Venky Mysore that led to him being appointed skipper.

“Unfortunately, Shreyas (Iyer) got injured. There were some problems for sure in the camp because it’s difficult to replace such a senior player. So, someone needed to step up. I went and spoke to coach Chandu Sir (Chandrakant Pandit), and CEO Venky Sir (Venky Mysore). I also spoke to Shah Rukh Sir (Shah Rukh Khan) that I am willing to take up the role,” said Rana.

“A lot of things were asked of me. I was told that the team didn’t want me to experience unnecessary pressure. I told them just one thing, that I enjoy pressure a lot and I play cricket for only these things. So these are the things that went in my favour and I got the captaincy. And I am proud that I got a chance to lead such a franchise”, he added.

As Shreyas Iyer was back to the KKR team with full fitness, the franchise announced Nitish Rana as vice-captain and Iyer as captain for the upcoming IPL season. KKR boasts one of the highest purses of INR 32.7 crore for the upcoming auction on December 19.

Nitish Rana also praised former KKR coach Brendon McCullum for having a powerful impact on his captaincy skills.

“I had become a senior member of the side in the last 3-4 years. I had a leadership role in this period. This was started by Baz. He would always encourage me to think like a captain”, said Rana, via the aforementioned source.

“He [McCullum] said it’s not important that you’d be controlling the game, it’s not important that I will listen to what you say. But you have to keep your brain active about what captaincy is all about. So that helped me a lot,” he added.

Rana has been part of the IPL since 2016 and he played around 105 matches with 2500 runs at an average of 28.82 and a strike rate of 135.25. Meanwhile, Gautam Gambhir is back in the KKR franchise as a mentor who led the franchise to win 2 titles in 2012 and 2014.