'Do you want your career to end here?': How RCB captain Smriti Mandhana talked Renuka Singh out of quitting WPL

'Do you want your career to end here?': How RCB captain Smriti Mandhana talked Renuka Singh out of quitting WPL originally appeared on Cricket News. Add Cricket News as a Preferred Source by clicking here.KEY TAKEAWAYS:Renuka Singh Thakur asked to be sent home as she struggled for form during RCB's first WPL season in 2023.Smriti Mandhana talked her out of it despite struggling with her own form.Renuka had been bought for ₹1.5 crore, the third-most expensive player in RCB's squad.Renuka Singh almost gave up on RCB career due to struggling formRenuka Singh Thakur arrived at the inaugural Women's Premier League in 2023 as one of the most sought-after Indian bowlers in the auction. Within weeks, she was asking her captain to let her leave.The Himachal Pradesh seamer recently revealed on Flimygyaan that period in an interview, explaining that an injury and a run of poor returns left her unable to make sense of what was happening to her."I remember going to Smriti and saying that I don't want to play, I am not able to perform," Renuka said. "So she told me to my face that not like I am performing either." It only escalated from there."So I went to her, I said to her, 'Yaar, I don't want to play. Please send me home. I can't do this anymore.'" Mandhana's response was the one Renuka now credits with keeping her in the game."Then she sat me down and said just one thing: 'Look, if I send you back today, then from here, do you want your name, your whole career, to be finished? Or do you want to grow further?'"Renuka told her she did want to go further but could not do it at that moment, that her mental peace was not right. Mandhana did not accept it."She said, 'Look, I've seen so many players who give up. But if you stay here, I don't want you to give up. If you face this thing, tomorrow you'll come out different,'" Renuka recalled, adding that Mandhana told her repeatedly she would come back and thank her for the decision.There was a compromise of sorts, though not the one Renuka wanted. "I said, 'Don't play me now, at least don't play me.' Then she said, 'Fine, you want me not to play you but don't talk about leaving, don't go back. Face this thing.'"MORE: Are Smriti Mandhana and Harmanpreet Kaur at odds? Unspoken tensions brewing as Indian cricket braces for changing of the guardWhy that first WPL season was so hard for RenukaThe pressure Renuka describes had a figure attached to it. RCB bought her for ₹1.5 crore at the 2023 auction, behind only Smriti Mandhana at ₹3.4 crore and Richa Ghosh at ₹1.9 crore in their squad, after she had been named ICC Women's Emerging Cricketer of the Year for 2022."I was sold for so much money so that was additional pressure," she said. "I never got this much money so that was more pressure that a team has trusted me so much and bought me for so much money and I was not able to perform."She was also carrying an injury into a tournament nobody had played before. RCB lost their opening game to Delhi Capitals by 60 runs and finished fourth of five in the league stage.What Renuka returns to most is that Mandhana was going through her own poor run at the same time and chose to manage the dressing room rather than herself."She was herself struggling because she was unable to perform. But she still, I mean, made an environment, so that we would feel better and we wouldn't think that we are losing," Renuka said. She was not calm about any of it. "I was crying in front of her saying, 'Yaar Smriti, I can't do it.'"MORE: Who is Uma Kashvi? 15-year-old makes WPL history with DCThe Cricket News Opinion: Mandhana's pep-talk helped Renuka stay and RCB to win maiden title following yearRCB won the WPL the following year, beating Delhi Capitals in the 2024 final for the franchise's first title across both its men's and women's teams, and won it again in 2026 with Mandhana named player of the match in the final. Renuka was part of both squads.That is the tidy version, and it is not really the point. What Renuka is describing is a captain who had a player asking to go home mid-tournament and chose to keep her there rather than take the easier option of letting her leave quietly.She is also open about why she went to Mandhana in the first place, saying that people are frightened of words like mental and depression, and that her own habit is to talk to someone rather than sit with it. Three years on, with RCB twice champions and Renuka still in the India setup, both halves of that conversation look like they were worth having.For all the latest cricket news, opinion, and commentary, and to share your voice, head to our Facebook, Instagram, and X (Twitter) pages.