Beyond the Boundary: A Candid Conversation with Ravi Ningegowda on Leading Royal Challengers Belfast to Glory

Welcome back to the Don't Bowl There cricket blog. In today's article is an interview with Ravi Ningegowda who is the strategic mind behind Royal Challengers Belfast (RCB). Within the interview, we discuss the formation and ethos of RCB, the plans for the future and much more.

So what is the background of RCB and how was the club created?

Royal Challengers Belfast (RCB) is a unique Social Sports Club based in Belfast, Northern Ireland, which is open to all, without affecting their existing Club affiliations. The genesis of RCB was to promote Health, Wellbeing and Equality through sports. We operate as per our tag line and adhere to it which is "Royal by Name and Equal by Game" in true sense and spirit. We welcome all Sports enthusiast individual, irrespective of their skill levels and make them feel a part of the group. Though cricket takes the major attention of RCB, we also run an active badminton and table tennis sessions throughout the year along with other sports activities such as Go Karting Championship, Badminton Championships etc. 

RCB did not want to be a separate League Club as we already have many clubs under NCU doing fantastic job to promote cricket, rather we wanted to take an approach to create a platform which will be accessible to all people without affecting their existing club affiliations.

RCB members play for various league clubs and members are from various nationalities i.e. UK, Irish, India, Spain, South Africa, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Australia etc. RCB operates with no fixed commitments or contracts from its members and hence, it gives flexibility to the members to suit their personal schedule.

Ravi, could you share with us your role and contributions within RCB?

RCB is run on a voluntary basis by its members as per the activities. For governing purposes, we have a five member committee which works behind the scenes and, I, am the Founding committee member of RCB. 

My role along with other committee members include overall organisation and functioning of the club upholding the constitution of the Club. To name a few roles, managing the social media, planning and organising various activities such as Indoor Cricket nets, Indoor Cricket Tournaments, Outdoor T20/The Hundred format tournaments, coordinating with Overseas Cricket Tours, Club documentation etc. 

That's great to hear Ravi. So how many members would you roughly have at present involved with RCB?

RCB currently has more than one thousand social members involved with the club and over a hundred paid members at present.

What are your goals for the future of RCB?

RCB aims to become the go to platform for everyone beyond their regular league clubs to practice, build network and enhance their skill sets at their own schedule and interest. Currently, RCB Indoor Nets in winter, is a big hit and emerged as a massive success among kids and adults.

RCB wants to work very closely with the Northern Cricket Union (NCU) along with all the registered league clubs within the province. RCB is currently running Cricket Connects program through the NCU and Cricket Ireland with the sessions being delivered by Ruhan Pretorius and Craig Irvine. We set the mast high with the vision to run more of these in the future.

Additionally, we want to be the pioneers in organising cricket tournaments in Northern Ireland and invite teams from the UK, Europe and further afield to compete in these. The last tournament which we ran was the Royal Premier League 2023 which has 12 teams in total featuring 2 sides from England. The winners of the event also won £1000 cash prize. The tournament itself was hosted by Downpatrick CC and had many NCU officials in attendance. We aim to improve this tournament year on year.

What was your experience like going away to La Manga with RCB last year?

Last year was an excellent opportunity for our players to gain experience of playing cricket in different overseas conditions and against an excellent calibre of opposition. It was also a great opportunity to network with other individuals who share the same passion for the great game of cricket as we do.  

Is there any tours scheduled away for this year following on from the success of RCB's last trip to La Manga in 2023?

Yes we are going to be heading off to compete in the same tournament as we did last year in La Manga between the 21st to the 25th March 2024. It will be brilliant to compete against teams from England, Ireland, Germany, Wales, India, Ireland and Spain again. 

I would like to take the time to thank Ravi for all his help answering these questions and wish him and the rest of the RCB team an enjoyable tour away to La Manga in March and a successful 2024 season.