When Shah Rukh Khan retaliated at Sunil Gavaskar for claiming that he doesn’t know how to manage KKR, remarked, ‘You buy a team, you run it’: IPL turns 18

Shah Rukh Khan was totally disturbed when Sunil Gavaskar pointed out the problems with the functioning of KKR in its earlier seasons.

Shah Rukh Khan‘s franchise Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) entered the Indian Premier League (IPL) right from the inaugural season of IPL in 2008 and is now 18 years old. Though KKR now boasts of three IPL victories, things at the beginning of IPL for KKR were quite tumultuous. So much so that SRK even had a war of words with legendary cricketer Sunil Gavaskar. The episode occurred in 2009, on the eve of the second season of IPL, when Gavaskar denounced KKR‘s then-coach John Buchanan‘s theory of having many captains. The first season of IPL was not good for KKR as they finished sixth among eight teams. When Sunil suggested that he does not know how to manage a team, SRK replied that maybe the seasoned cricketer should purchase his own team and manage it.

Speaking in a documentary series titled Living with KKR, Shah Rukh stated that “nobody likes to be picked on“ and termed Sunil‘s remarks as “ungentlemanly.” “Nobody likes to lose and nobody likes to lose again and again, and nobody likes to be picked on. Half the people turned around and said ‘we don‘t know how to play cricket‘ but we never said that we know how to play cricket. I am a team owner.“. I own VFX, I don‘t know how to do VFX on my laptop. And then when you get attacked like that, I think you get a bit defensive. I recall Gavaskar saab, he once told me something that we don‘t know how to manage the team. I told him, ‘so you purchase a team and you manage it‘. It became totally ungentlemanly,” he said.

He told us that you need to learn how to lose with dignity when you play a sport. “You got to take sport as sport. Yeah it‘s disappointing and yes, it makes you angry. At a personal level, in your room, say what you want but in a larger context, I think sports needs to develop the first thing – the sense of learning how to lose but not becoming losers,” he said.

In 2009, Sunil criticized Buchanan‘s theory of multiple skipper and wrote for The Telegraph, “To comment on his multiple skipper theory is to give it the importance it doesn‘t deserve but what does require comment is how he has got his Queensland pals lucrative jobs with KKR.” He further commented, “The owners – poor souls – have little idea that they are being milked.

Shah Rukh had replied at an event where there was a promotional session and declared, “Maine paisa kharch kiya yaar, bahut passion hai (I have spent the money, there‘s too much passion). If you have a problem, you can buy your own (team) and run it the way you want.”

A couple of days later, SRK apologized to Gavaskar and informed PTI, “If Gavaskar tells me to walk on my head and run the team, I would. Anything that Gavaskar says which pertains to cricket, if he says, should be done.” He informed that he even wrote an apology letter to Gavaskar and revealed, “I have not said anything against Gavaskar.“. I just wanted to have a breathing space to try something new. I have written an apology letter to him if he felt so because he was in America that time.