Every team cannot always win like Tendulkar: SRK

-- Atmosphere at Eden Gardens unmatched, says star owner --

The Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) principal owner Shah Rukh Khan said on Saturday that it was not possible for every team to keep winning like Sachin Tendulkar, but promised the fans that his Knights would give their best to lift the Indian Premier League (IPL) this season.

Speaking at a promotional, the Bollywood superstar expressed his hopes and ambition for the KKR in the upcoming edition of the Twenty20 event.

The following are excerpts:

His expectations from this year’s IPL
Nobody likes to lose. Sometimes you lose to win again, you fall to rise higher. We have miles to go and promises to keep. We will try and lift the IPL this year. Even though we are in Mumbai, we would take the trophy to Calcutta. I would also like to see Mumbai Indians do well, as also the other franchises, but I want our team to better than the others.

If Dav Whatmore is a better coach than John Buchanan
John was a good coach, but I think communication (between him and the players) was a problem. We decided to change the coach in the best interest of the team. I felt sad to see him go. Probably, it was due to the language or the age factor. But Dav has worked with the Sri Lankan and Bangladesh teams and also been with the National Cricket Academy. So, communication has improved this time.

KKR’s performance in the last edition
I think we played well, but sport is like that. A loss doesn’t mean it’s a bad performance. Every team is not like Sachin (Tendulkar) who always wins. He is a genius. Maybe it was the multiple captains’ theory; maybe we worked hard but not hard enough… But I believe that our performance in the second season was better than the first because the matches we lost were by a close margin.

The colour of the jersey being changed
There were a lot of suggestions (following the team’s poor performance in the first two seasons). Juhi (Chawla) said ‘let’s change the colour’. But I don’t think anyone in the team is superstitious. I do pray, and we say prayers in the dressing room before every match. But the players know it’s about performance. Actually, when you lose, you want to change every thing and start afresh.

On IPL returning to India
There’s always a buzz when you are playing at home, it’s a wonderful feeling. I don’t want to take anything away from the other venues, but it’s a different feeling at Eden Gardens that you won’t get anywhere. I have attended World Cup matches and been to many venues, but that feeling is incomparable.

On the IPL-broadcasters impasse
I am not involved in the discussions. I hope it gets resolved because it will benefit both of us (the IPL and the media). It will be a great thing.

The Indian hockey team
I should have gone there (to the World Cup). I am thrilled with the way entire India has taken to the game. I think we should have more international matches and tournaments like this in India. I have played hockey. So I know hockey better than cricket. There has been a jump in our standards. I say once more, Chak de India!

TWITTER UPDATES: SRK wears KKR's New Uniform

SRK: finally wore the kkr reebok official purple jersey at the nokia launch. looked very nice.my son thought it was less macho than the black one

SRK: The back says xxx..its a new energy drink. hope u all like the new uniform.

SRK invites people to coach his IPL team

Ahead of IPL season 3, Bollywood superstar Shah Rukh Khan on Saturday invited the people to coach his Kolkata Knight Riders team and send in their suggestions for improving its performance.

"When we used to lose, I used to get inundated with messages, mostly suggestions. I feel sad when we lose, but you have to take all those losses with little bit of ease and a little sense of humour and all those messages and emails, I used to keep them," he said at the launch of the Main Bhi Coach programme in association with Nokia India in Mumbai.

"Keeping in mind peoples' habit of giving suggestions, I decided with the team of Nokia that this time we will launch something which would be called Main Bhi Coach which would officially give everyone a chance to coach KKR and suggest what should we do for our team," he said.

Shah Rukh said people could messages to 9664555555, and all these would be discussed with the team and the coach to see if the ideas could help in improving the team.

Shah Rukh said he is quite positive about his team this season.

"It happens in sports...one team wins and the other loses. I doesn't mean that the team losing is lazy or it doesn't want to win or it is a bad team. When one team competes, it competes to win. I won't say that we didn't work hard. Maybe our decision of multiple captains was not right, we can find excuses but the bottom line is that we worked hard, we played very hard but not hard enough."

"We need to play harder, we need to play tougher and we need to win this," Shah Rukh said.

On the controversy over the deal with Lux Cozi, he said he had kept in on hold because he doesn't want to hurt anyone with his decision.

"We wanted to have lot of local partners. If you have local partners it's nicer. Legally, as a company and in every way I thought it was above board.... it made some people unhappy and what happened over the last six months, I truly believe that lot of people love and support me and I don't want to hurt anybody and even our partners so we have kept it on hold because that's what some members in Kolkata wanted," he said.

IN PICS: SRK, Saif back as Filmfare hosts

Shah Rukh Khan along with Saif Ali Khan hosted the 55th Filmfare awards this year. (Photo: Viral Bhayani)


Shah Rukh Khan along with Saif Ali Khan hosted the prestigious awards show this year. (Photo: Viral Bhayani)

Shake a leg with Shahrukh Khan

The Kolkata Knight Riders have not won the title yet, but when it comes to creating brand value they are miles ahead of the rest.

In yet another marketing ploy, Kolkata Knight Riders have announced a ticket for Rs 32,000 per day that includes access to the super speciality enclosures at the Eden Gardens and to the post-match parties.

That means you can rub shoulders with the who's who of the cricket world and the Bollywood fraternity for a price that is almost five times expensive than the maximum priced ticket of Rs 6,500.

It is also reported that this marketing move has been devised in an attempt to maximise profit with the Eden Gardens' capacity nearly halved to 44,000 due to renovation.

Extra buzz with IPL's return to India: Shah Rukh

There's going to be an extra buzz when the Indian Premier League is held in India after it was held in South Africa last year, said Kolkata Knight Riders' owner and Bollywood star Shah Rukh Khan here today (6th March 2010).

"There's always a buzz in playing here and it's a wonderful feeling. The feeling one gets playing in front of 100,000 people at the Eden Gardens is incomparable," said Shah Rukh at a function to announce his franchise's continued partnership with Nokia India.

On replacing coach John Buchanan with another Australian Dav Whatmore, he said that communication with the players was the former's problem in the first two years.

"Buchanan was a good coach but we all partners took the decision to replace him in the team's interest. Communication with the players was his problem due to the language or age factor," he said.

Neil traumatized after 'misbehaving' with Shah Rukh

"Never again!" Neil shudders at the very thouught of the way he was forced to misbehave on stage with Shah Rukh Khan....by Shah Rukh Khan himself.

Trust SRK to espouse irreverence. But Neil hasn't been able to get over it. Katrina Kaif and Bipasha Basu were in a state of shock after Neil Nitin Mukesh's outburst on stage against Shah Rukh Khan at the Filmfare awards.

They both rushed to Neil in panic asking him to apologize to SRK.

Two days after Neil Nitin Mukesh told co-hosts Shah Rukh Khan and Saif Ali Khan to just plainly and simply shutup on stage at the Filmfare awards at Yashraj films, the debate rages in the film industry.

Was the well-behaved blue-eyed-boy's aggressive impudence towards his superstarry seniors on Neil's home turf (he's known as a full-on Yashraj boy) for real? Or was it just an act?

To rewind a bit….at the Filmfare awards co-hosts Shah Rukh and Saif Ali Khan decided to take on Neil on stage, riling him endlessly. The final straw was the digs that Shah Rukh took at Neil's name.

“Neil, ” said Shah Rukh, “Why do you have three first names and no surname? My name is Khan. Saif too is a Khan. How come you have no last name?”

Neil couldn't take the slight to his family name. He not-so-gently reminded SRK that he ought to restrain himself because his, Neil's, father was sitting in the audience.

And then, horror of horrors, he told Shah Rukh to just shutup.

There was an uncomfortable silence in the auditorium.

Recalling the incident with an uncomfortable laugh Neil says, “I'm still shaking. Imagine me telling Shah Rukh Khan to shut up! But I did. That isn't all. At the end of the show I walked up to Shah Rukh and Saif and broke eggs on their heads.”

But relax. It was all part of an act.

“It was all planned by Shah Rukh Sir. I was told by the organizers the Moranis from beforehand that I was supposed to be part of Shah Rukh's act. I was supposed to reach early and rehearse for it.

But as luck would have it I had gone to town to pick up my parents and got stuck in the traffic. By the time I reached the venue there was only time for a quick briefing on what I had to do.”

Shah Rukh walked up to Neil and quickly told him the plan on stage.

Neil was aghast. “How could I say shut up to Shah Rukh Khan? I've never been rude even to my driver. But he insisted. He also told me to throw eggs at him and Saif at the end of the show. I begged and pleaded to spare me. But Shah Rukh didn't listen.”

Neil did his own on-the-spot improvisation on stage to spare himself the aggravated agony.

“Instead of throwing the eggs I walked up to Saif and Shah Rukh and broke the eggs on their heads. How could I throw eggs at them? Their fans would never forgive me!”

After the act Neil's shocked father has still not forgiven his son, although he has been told it was all in jest.

Says Neil, “Bipasha rushed to me and said if it was an act then it was really scary. Katrina stormed up to me after the show and told me to apologize to SRK, AT ONCE.”

Laughing nervously Neil relived the trauma of being forced to be rude to a hero he worships.

“I'm glad people finally got to see my mischievous side…But no thanks. Never again.”

My Name Is Khan conquers new territories for Bollywood!

It is old news that Karan Johar's MY NAME IS KHAN is re-writing history and creating box-office records in the Overseas market, wherever it has opened. And we will not give the details about how MNIK has broken all the records held by previous SRK movies in US or state that MNIK has already set a new high for UK by grossing £2,307,067 so far and still counting.

We are actually here to give our patrons an interesting insight into the business of MY NAME IS KHAN in the relatively unknown and uncharted territories, even places where no other Hindi film movie has been released before. First let us let you know about Bahrain, a small island in the Persian Gulf, where MY NAME IS KHAN is the first Hindi film to release and has topped the box-office charts collecting $148,800. The whole of Middle East sees a new record as MNIK has collected a total of $3.3 million, till we last heard.

Coming to the numbers in the exotic African countries, in the unknown and new territory of Ghana, the country known more for its cocoa, MNIK is the first Hindi film to release and it has created a sensation by topping the box-office charts collecting $7,443. In the country of the pyramids, Egypt the film opened to a superb response collecting $42,362. Moving on to South Africa (entire region), MY NAME IS KHAN has notched up an impressive $177,119.

Moving on to South East Asia, MY NAME IS KHAN has mopped up $301,094 from Singapore. In Malaysia MNIK has $120,452 to show. In Indonesia, the film has grown from six to 14 screens and has seen a jump of 300 percent in week three.

Well, certainly and without even a hint of doubt, Karan, SRK, Kajol and Fox have done Bollywood proud by daring to take their film to many hitherto un-explored territories and then topping the charts as well, creating history. And maybe this will open the doors for other Hindi films which will follow suit and thus give the citizens of those country a chance to celebrate Bollywood.

Well, the world is certainly following Bollywood's (King) KHAN!