Ace tennis player Sania Mirza doesn’t know much about cricket but in the inaugural season of the Women’s Premier League (WPL), she will tell the young Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) cricketers how to deal with the mental aspects as a player.
RCB has made Sania their mentor for the WPL. RCB is being led by Indian opener Smriti Mandhana and the team will open their campaign against Delhi Capitals on Sunday.
RCB has shared a video on its Twitter handle in which Sania is seen interacting with the team players. Sania said in this video, ‘I don’t know anything about cricket. I thought (when I was mentored) what am I going to do, what am I going to talk to the girls. I have recently said goodbye to the game. I thought my next step in life would be to help the women sportspersons of India.
@MirzaSania ,#playbold #SheIsBold #WPL2023 pic.twitter.com/WJjDLLBa7T
— Royal Challengers Bangalore (@RCBTweets) Mar 4, 2023
Sania said, ‘In any sport, I can help with the mental aspect. I have faced this for the last 20 years. Sania was asked by a player how difficult the decision to retire was for her. In response, she said, ‘I was really ready for this. I have a son who is four years old and to be honest the last one year has been a struggle. I had three operations. However, I thought of saying goodbye to the game while on top. I just wanted to stop.’
Sania said that her role as a mentor would be to help RCB march towards the WPL title. She said, ‘I was in an individual game, so photo shoots, media attention, everything I handled on my own. In such a situation, I thought that I can share such things with the girls.
This former player said, ‘It is normal to feel pressure in the game but you just have to find a way to deal with it. You have to ignore the outside discussion. Indian media is strict in such matters.
Describing struggle as a part of every sportsperson’s life, Sania said, ‘There is struggle in everything. We didn’t get a court (a place to play tennis), we used to play on a court that was smeared with cow dung. We didn’t have coaches. The coaches who were there were not experts. Then the girls have a different struggle of their own.
“Our job as an athlete is to inspire the next generation. The champion is not the one who is winning all the time, the real champion is the one who shows the will to win even after having a bad patch. “You have to remember why you started playing cricket, because you love the game,” he said.
